A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
A History of the SAMHSA
Minority Fellowship
Program
Building a National Network of Minority Behavioral Health
Professionals
To Address the Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Needs
Of Underserved People and Places in the United States
for the
Center for Mental Health Services
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
One Choke Cherry Road, Room 2–1116
Rockville, MD 20857
Produced by
Development Services Group, Inc.
7315 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite 800E
Bethesda, MD 20814
Under
Contract No. 283–07–3701
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Contents
Executive Summary .....................................................................................................................1
1. Background: The Need for the Minority Fellowship Program .......................................5
2. Minority Fellowship Program Goals .................................................................................15
3. Early Program Mission and Challenges ............................................................................17
4. Overcoming Initial Challenges: The Early Years (1973–1992) .......................................24
5. Evolution to Current Programs (1992–2002) ......................................................................39
6. Twenty-First Century Minority Fellowship Programs (2002–2012) .............................42
7. Program Indicators of Success .............................................................................................66
8. MFP Contributions to Behavioral Health Knowledge ...................................................71
9. Selected Profiles of MFP Fellows .......................................................................................82
10. Responding to New Opportunities and Challenges .....................................................12
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Executive Summary
S
ince 1973 the Federal Government has supported a model health
professions development initiative, the Minority Fellowship Program
(MFP). The program increases the number, capacity, and leadership
presence of minority individuals with doctoral degrees in mental health and
substance use disorder services, research, training, policy development, and
program administration.
Funding for the MFP is provided by the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services, initially from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
and most recently from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration (SAMHSA). The MFP, in turn, offers sustained grants to national
behavioral health professional associations. Through these grants, more than
1,500 MFP Fellows have received financial assistance and other supports that
have enabled them to complete doctoral degrees; engage in postdoctoral
behavioral health care research and study; secure career referrals and placement
in clinical, academic, or program positions; address community needs; and rise
to positions of leadership and prominence within their fields.
MFP grants to six national behavioral health membership organizations
encourage and enable minority Fellows to pursue leadership careers in

Psychiatry—through the American Psychiatric Association (“ApA”)
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Psychology—with the American Psychological Association (“APA”)

Nursing—the American Nurses Association (“ANA”)

Social Work—the Council on Social Work Education (“CSWE”)

Marriage and Family Therapy—the American Association of Marriage
and Family Therapy (“AAMFT”)

Counselors—the National Board for Certified Counselors and Affiliates
(“NBCC”)
This report summarizes the history of the MFP. It traces the MFP’s evolution
since its inception nearly four decades ago. The paper also highlights the unique
contributions of former and current MFP Fellowship recipients to the building of
behavioral health knowledge, leadership, and service capacity for our nation’s
underserved African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, Asian
Americans, and other minorities—many of whom reside in underserved urban
and rural areas. The report describes early challenges faced and overcome by
MFP administrators and Fellows as they worked to create “almost from scratch”
a core cadre of highly trained, skilled, and motivated minority professionals to
expand and enrich the focus of behavioral health research and practice. Because
of initial grants from NIMH and continued support from SAMHSA and
professional association Grantees, the MFP is systematically developing and
sustaining a strong network of extremely capable and dedicated minority
behavioral health professionals. The MFP network is now well positioned to help
recruit, train, and deploy an expanded, more informed, and culturally competent
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
workforce that will be needed to reach and help millions of minority individuals
and families newly covered by health care reform and mental health parity laws.
This history of MFP challenges, successes, and lessons learned is intended to
serve as a useful resource for the MFP Grantees; for prospective and new MFP
Fellows; and for leaders seeking to increase minority capacity building efforts for
other health and human service professions in collaboration with universities,
other teaching institutions, and program funders and service systems.
A note regarding language: Across the six behavioral health disciplines, there
is no general agreement today regarding how best to describe people who seek
or need behavioral health services. The term “patient “ is typical within nursing
and psychiatry, reflecting the use of a bio-medical model. “Identified patient”
and “index person” have been common terms in the marriage and family
therapy profession, reflecting the perspective that many people are involved in
the problem and all of them can help address it. Over the time (?), the term
“client” has been the favored term among many practitioners. “Consumer” also
is popular among some marriage and family therapists in private practice. The
counseling profession has consistently preferred “client,” as has the psychology
profession. Within the social work discipline, “client” has become more accepted
than “patient,” but “patient” is common among social workers in health care
settings. Some social workers also use “consumer.” Service providers and users
in all six behavioral health disciplines who work within a recovery framework
use “person in recovery” or “person with lived experience.” Some service users
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
have adopted “consumer.” Others favor the term “survivor.” In addition, the
term “service participant” is sometimes preferred over “service recipient” or
“service user” as both “recipient” and “user” suggest the passivity and unequal
power relationship associated with “patient.”
Despite the lack of agreement on a single term for describing people who seek
or need behavioral health care, more consensus exists now than at any other time
in the history of the behavioral health disciplines about the potential harm
caused by language and by practices that stigmatize, dehumanize, and
disempower. SAMHSA has played a leading role in facilitating the shift away
from such language and practices by launching the Recovery to Practice initiative
and other national efforts. Consistent with the shift toward language and
practices that recognize each individual’s uniqueness, worth, rights, and
potential, this report uses “person-first” language that describes individuals with
behavioral health conditions as people first (for example, “person with a
substance use disorder” replaces “addict.”)
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
1. Background:
The Need for the Minority Fellowship
Program
O
ver the past four decades, the Minority Fellowship Program (MFP)
has sought to redress historic racial and ethnic disparities in the
reach, relevance, and quality of mental health and substance use
programs in the United States. The MFP was created as a key component of a
concerted national effort in the late 20th century to 1) expand care for mental
health and substance use disorders to everyone in need, especially among
underserved people and places, 2) improve the quality and outcomes of services
through research-based identification and adoption of best practices, and 3) build
a correspondingly robust and competent professional workforce across all
behavioral health disciplines that could meet these challenges. Since its
inception, the MFP has nurtured and sustained the professional development of
minorities to address:

Unmet behavioral health service needs of minorities

Underrepresentation of minorities as behavioral health service providers

Underrepresentation of minorities in behavioral health research

Lack of attention to minority health issues in professional training
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Unmet Behavioral Health
Service Needs of Minorities
Modern reform of mental health and substance use treatment in the United
States, which includes the creation and sustained support of the MFP, began after
World War II. Between 1946 and 1980, the nation experienced an exponential
growth in public awareness of mental health needs and a corresponding
government commitment to expand the research and treatment of mental
disorders. A similar increase in the public’s awareness and in the government’s
sense of urgency occurred in the 1960s in response to a rapidly broadening
availability and use of illicit drugs across all segments of society—and especially
among the nation’s youth and low-income urban populations. Most important,
behavioral health policymakers and service providers during this period began
to concentrate on addressing longstanding disparities in the nature, availability,
and quality of mental health and substance use treatment for minorities.
Traditionally, those able to pay for mental health care, who were
disproportionately from non-minority groups, sought treatment in private clinics
or hospitals, or from individual professionals in private practice. Low-income
persons, disproportionately African American or other minorities, were either
refused service or forced to seek scarce help from overcrowded, under-funded,
and poorly staffed charity or publicly supported clinics and hospitals. A
disproportionate number of minority persons with severe mental illnesses were
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
committed to, and confined in, state mental institutions or sentenced to long
terms in prison where they received little or no treatment.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the federal government launched a national
effort to improve mental health treatment and reduce or eliminate these
disparities of care associated with economics, geographic location, and race and
ethnicity. New federal laws and regulations banned racial discrimination in
publicly funded programs, including those engaged in serving persons with
mental health and/or substance use disorders. Through the Community Mental
Health Act of 1963 (Public Law 88–164), the federal government launched a
network of community mental health centers to provide care to underserved
people and places, especially those in minority and low-income communities.
Federal, state, and local governments correspondingly began augmenting
financial support for local substance use disorder treatment programs to address
a significant rise in illicit drug marketing, availability, and use throughout
society, and disproportionately targeted to youth and minority urban
populations.
National concern and efforts to expand services for mental health and
substance use disorders were further sharpened and challenged by U.S. Supreme
Court decisions between 1970 and 2000. These decisions found that the civil
rights of many special-needs groups, including institutionalized people with
mental illness, were being violated because services were being delivered in
isolated, frequently oppressive, settings removed from family and other
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
community supports. In response, federal, state, and local governments
undertook the “deinstitutionalization” of people with mental illness from state
mental hospitals to local communities. The intention was that these individuals
would receive care in their natural communities and be supported in the “least
restrictive environments” possible given their condition. The number of people
housed in state psychiatric facilities declined by 65 percent between 1968 and
1978, plummeting from 399,000 in 1969 to 132,000 by 1980.
The “promise” of community-based services and supports for people with
severe mental illness was not, and has not been, fulfilled. Inadequate funding for
community-based behavioral health services over the past three decades has left
hundreds of thousands of Americans who might otherwise have been at least
housed in state mental institutions now bereft of timely and appropriate
treatment, housing, and other supportive services. Many remain untreated,
unemployed, poor, and homeless. Many adults end up in jail or prison, where
few receive adequate care for mental health or substance use disorders. Juvenile
detention centers across the nation are considered as an “alternative” mental
health system for children and youth. As the nation’s minority groups continue
to grow in the 21st century, they are becoming even more disproportionately
represented among behavioral health’s underreached and underserved.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Underrepresentation of Minorities as Behavioral Health Service
Providers
It was within this context of general expansion of behavioral health services
and professional opportunities from the 1960s through the 1980s that the need
for increasing minority participation in all aspects of behavioral health came into
glaring public policy focus. Using any measure of comparison, African
Americans, Hispanic Americans, and other minorities have been traditionally
underrepresented in behavioral health policy settings, research focal points,
training, and service provision. While each behavioral health profession could in
the past point to early and exemplary minority successes—such as pioneering
professional training, clinical practice, or program leadership—these examples of
minority engagement and participation were few and far between. As public and
private behavioral health services expanded exponentially in the 1960s, 1970s,
and 1980s, addressing the behavioral health system’s obvious lack of readiness
and capacity to meet the needs of underserved people and communities became
an urgent imperative. Issues included the following:
1. Which groups most needed, and likely would be reached by, new publicly
financed behavioral health services?
2. Was the workforce adequately informed, staffed, and competent to meet
the treatment and service needs of minority persons in underserved
urban and rural areas?
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
3. Would those needing professional care seek help? With whom would
these individuals most likely form the best helping relationships and
have the best outcomes ?
4. Were culturally competent approaches used to assess needs and provide
care?
5. Were interventions designed for use with minority persons tested and
robustly researched with minority groups before implementation?
In response to these and other important concerns, special initiatives such as
the MFP were created to build a long-term infrastructure of minority
professionals among key behavioral health disciplines and, with this
infrastructure, to infuse minority leadership capacity in all aspects of behavioral
health training and service delivery.
The need for more minority representation among behavioral health service
providers continued throughout the 40-year history of the MFP, and is now
becoming even more critical as the nation implements the Patient Protection and
Affordable Care Act of 2010 (“Health Care Reform”; Public Law 111–148), and
the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction
Equity Act of 2008 (“Mental Health Parity Act”; Public Law 110–343). Between
the two laws, millions of previously uninsured and unserved minority
individuals and families—many of whom live in underserved urban and rural
communities—will become eligible for mental health and substance use disorder
assistance on a par with other health services. Literally thousands of new
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
behavioral health professionals across all disciplines will be needed to meet this
enormous service challenge, and a significant portion of new service providers
will be called on to offer “culturally competent” services. Current and former
MFP Fellows, now serving on faculties and in educational leadership positions at
major behavioral health training institutions, are well situated to respond quickly
to the heightened workforce demands ahead. Fellows are also in health systems
where they serve as role models, decision makers, and policymakers.
Underrepresentation of Minorities in Behavioral Health Research
For all the reasons described above, minorities have historically been
underrepresented in behavioral health research—as distinct and statistically
significant study participants; and as program administrators and investigators.
Before the advent of the Minority Fellowship Program and other minority
professional training initiatives, only a small number of behavioral health
programs in institutions of higher education outside of Historically Black
Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) sought or admitted minority students into
baccalaureate clinical training programs, and even fewer into master, doctoral, or
postdoctoral programs and internships. Consequently, much of what was
learned from research on the bio/behavioral foundations and manifestations of
mental illness or substance use disorders—and on the relative efficacy of various
treatment modalities and interventions—may or may not have been particularly
valid or effective when applied to the needs and behavioral health conditions of
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
various racial and ethnic minorities. In mainstream institutions of learning,
faculties were not interested in, or academically equipped for, guiding and
directing minority graduate students through the exploration of research topics
related to their own interests and racial and ethnic groups. The historical absence
of minorities from most behavioral health research raises questions about the
relevance and value of “best practices” grounded in such research when these
practices are applied to serving minority people.
Lack of Attention to Minority Health Issues in Professional
Training
When the MFP was established, few behavioral health professional training
programs outside of those offered by HBCUs included in their curricula any
mention of the behavioral health conditions and needs of minorities that might
call for tailored services or interventions. Similarly, mainstream institutions that
might have enrolled small numbers of Hispanic American, Native American, or
other minority graduate students paid little or no attention to the particular
behavioral health conditions or service needs of these groups in their behavioral
health training curricula or research agendas.
These higher education system omissions mirrored broader societal patterns
of discrimination based in law, and almost universal inattention and neglect to
minority needs in general. In addition, during the early days of the civil rights
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
movement, the notion of “equality” was equated with “sameness.” Any sense of
“difference” could connote “inequality.” Over the years, however, our society
has come to understand and respect differences among people, and among and
within groups, and to acknowledge that these differences often require tailored,
person- or group-specific actions to achieve comparable outcomes.
Several nationally commissioned reports on minority behavioral health needs
identify critical features of culturally competent care (i.e., care that is
appropriately responsive to the many differences among and within minority
groups). These reports include the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services’ Report of the Secretary’s Task Force on Black and Minority Health (1985); the
Surgeon General’s report on Mental Health: Culture, Race, and Ethnicity—A
Supplement to Mental Health: A Report of the Surgeon General (2001); and President
George W. Bush’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health’s report on
Achieving the Promise: Transforming Mental Health Care in America—Final Report
(2003). Along with the most often cited need for proficiency in the primary
languages of the persons being served, the reports suggest other basic features of
culturally competent care , including

Knowledge and consideration of racial and ethnic family systems,
patterns of interaction and communication, customs, and traditions

Awareness and consideration of common multigenerational histories and
experiences (such as discrimination, persecution, economic deprivation,
trauma, or violence)
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Awareness and consideration of historical minority-specific attitudes
toward seeking help within or outside the family and “community”

Awareness and consideration of historical minority-specific attitudes
toward mental illness

Knowledge of minority-specific differences in the incidence and severity
of health conditions (such as diabetes or hypertension) and potentially
disproportional health risks associated with prescribed and/or
nonprescription drug combinations
The MFP has invested almost four decades of funding and other supports to
recruit, train, mentor, place, and promote minority behavioral health researchers,
clinicians, policymakers, investigators, and program administrators. The purpose
of these efforts has been to build a solid knowledge base that informs culturally
competent training in institutions of higher education, and strengthens the
delivery of mental health and substance use disorder services for minorities.
Hundreds of former and current MFP Fellows have become highly capable
behavioral health knowledge creators, educators, practitioners, and
administrators —all seeking to ensure that minorities receive relevant and
effective mental health and substance use services.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
2. Minority Fellowship Program Goals
T
he goals of the Minority Fellowship Program are
1. Minority Behavioral Health Leaders. To increase the number of
African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, Asian
Americans, and other minorities that enroll in, and complete, doctoral and
postdoctoral training programs in behavioral health; and that pursue
leadership careers in behavioral health service delivery, research,
professional training, policy development, program administration, and
community involvement.
2. Culturally Competent Care to Underserved People and Places. To create and
sustain a national network of minority behavioral health educators,
researchers, service providers, and clinical program administrators with the
cultural competence needed to reach, engage, and meet the needs of
minorities in underserved communities.
3. Minority-Focused Research to Improve Knowledge Base and Service
Outcomes. To build a growing cadre of minority investigators and research
administrators in behavioral health research and training institutions who
help improve outcomes for minority persons by expanding the knowledge
base concerning minority behavioral health (including mental health and
substance use conditions and service needs, appropriate prevention and
early detection strategies, and effective interventions).
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
4. Minority Participation in Policy Setting. To increase the presence and
contribution of minority professionals to behavioral health policy setting at
the local, state, regional, national, and international levels.
5. Interdisciplinary Teamwork and Coordination. To utilize the network of
behavioral health professional organizations that receive MFP grants to
achieve common focus and interdisciplinary teamwork in all aspects of
behavioral health policy development, research, education, program
administration, and service to minorities and underserved communities.
6. Building and Sustaining a Relevant Knowledge Base. To inform the scientific
and clinical practice literature about mental illness and substance use
disorder prevention, early detection, treatment, and recovery relevant to
serving minority people.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
3. Early Program Mission and Challenges
Initial Mission
I
n 1973 the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) initiated what was
then called the Ethnic Minority Fellowship Program (EMFP). After offering
a pioneering grant to the American Sociological Association (ASA), the
program quickly responded to the need to provide long-term support to a
broader cross-section of behavioral health disciplines, by enlisting the
participation of four of the six current national health professions’ associations
that administer MFP Fellowships: the American Psychiatric Association (ApA),
the American Psychological Association (APA), the American Nurses
Association (ANA), and the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE). The
program was later expanded, in 2007, to include Fellowship support for marriage
and family therapists through the American Association of Marriage and Family
Therapy (AAMFT). In 2012, the program was expanded further to include
Fellowship support for counselors through the National Board for Certified
Counselors and Affiliates (NBCC).
The singular mission of the NIMH–funded EMFP was to attract and train
minority health professionals to pursue careers in mental health. Each of the four
participating behavioral health associations created Fellowship awards and other
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
supports that best met their discipline’s education, training, and professional
development needs and protocols:

For psychiatry, the ApA initially offered postdoctoral Fellowships to
psychiatrists (who had earned their doctoral degrees in medicine) to
conduct research studies or projects concentrating on mental health
treatment needs, protocols, and outcomes, often among minorities. The
intent of these Fellowships was to interest psychiatrists in the field of
mental health research and to help advance the early investigative
opportunities of those already expressing an interest or commitment to
the behavioral health field.

For psychology, nursing, and social work, the three professional
associations representing these disciplines (APA, ANA, and CSWE,
respectively) offered Fellowships to students pursuing doctoral degrees in
their chosen field to engage in mental health research and teaching. Some
postdoctoral Fellowship awards were made over the years to help support
special studies or projects specifically emphasizing minority behavioral
health issues.
Challenges
The EMFP started slowly and had to overcome many challenges:
RECRUITMENT. Across all four behavioral health disciplines initially supported
by the EMFP— psychiatry, psychology, nursing, and social work—eligible
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
minority candidates for doctoral and postdoctoral Fellowships were difficult to
find and recruit when the program began. In the very early 1970s (before the
establishment of the EMFP [later the MFP] and complementary efforts to expand
postsecondary and graduate program opportunities for minorities), few
institutions of higher education other than Historically Black Colleges and
Universities (HBCUs) offered persons of color opportunities to enroll in
graduate-level behavioral health professional training programs. HBCU
opportunities for such training at the doctoral and postdoctoral levels were
almost nonexistent.
Racial
and ethnic minority students admitted to nonminority medical schools
and other behavioral health professional education programs often struggled
with social isolation, academic readiness issues, and an absence of financial,
communal, and other instructional supports to help them succeed. Many
dropped out before completing coursework and other requirements for
baccalaureate or masters’ degrees. And, because clinical or administrative careers
in behavioral health fields other than psychiatry (e.g., nursing, psychology,
social work) did not require doctoral training, only a few minority students in
these fields that were seeking careers in research or postgraduate instruction
pursued doctoral and postdoctoral credentialing. These minority doctoral and
postdoctoral students were scattered among many institutions of higher
education. They often were the only member of their racial or ethnic group to be
enrolled, and they often had no contact with other students in similar situations.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Another issue facing minority students pursuing doctoral and postdoctoral
training was the lack of majority faculty members who were interested in, or
concerned about, the issues that were priorities for minority Fellows. Majority
faculty members also did not have the expertise to guide and direct much of their
minority Fellows’ training or research in these priority issue areas.
Finally, there was no formal or informal network of minority professional
leaders, minority graduate school administrators, faculty, or students to help
identify, reach, and link eligible students to EMFP Fellowship opportunities. Few
employment opportunities were available, especially in leadership positions.
RETENTION. Once recruited, a significant number of early EMFP Fellows had
difficulties staying in their programs and completing doctoral degrees or
postdoctoral projects. Many dropped out or “just gave up,” primarily because
they lacked support or grew exhausted trying to survive in non-supportive
environments. Early MFP Fellows across the four behavioral health disciplines
were often the only minorities in their doctoral or postdoctoral programs and
experienced difficult periods of social isolation. They did not, or could not,
participate in traditional peer-supportive activities, including formal and
informal study groups and other social activities. MFP Fellows who were
enrolled in non–HBCU doctoral programs experienced few special mentoring or
role-modeling relationships with faculty or administrative staff. Because of their
minority status, MFP Fellows were frequently asked to take on additional
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
program “representational” assignments, such as service on program or
recruitment committees, which diverted time and energy away from completing
doctoral degree requirements. Few of them had opportunities to develop their
own research or expertise in a specific area of inquiry. In addition, the MFP
Fellows who completed an extended tenure at a minority institution discovered
that leaders in mainstream institutions perceived their academic portfolios as
insufficient to merit consideration for faculty or leadership-type appointments.
READINESS OF MFP FELLOWSHIP APPLICANTS AND RECIPIENTS. Throughout much
of history, MFP Fellows often were the first in their families to go to college or
pursue a professional career, especially in behavioral health. Before pursuing
their doctorates or undertaking postdoctoral study, almost all had demonstrated
excellence in learning clinical practice skills, both in the classroom and as
experienced mental health—or substance use—disorder service providers. Few,
however, were adequately exposed to, or informed about, essential aspects of the
science of behavioral health and evidence-based practice, including scientific
theories, research, and knowledge development. Few doctoral-level graduate
programs in which MFP Fellows were enrolled offered courses or extra help to
address a lack of exposure to, or mastery of, advanced academic skills such as the
scientific writing required to prepare a dissertation, critical thinking and
analysis, and the application of research findings to clinical practice and public
policy.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
INSTITUTIONAL TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES. As previously indicated, there were
few opportunities for minorities to enroll in behavioral health doctoral and
postdoctoral training programs, especially when the initial EMFP was created.
Most graduate programs, including those in HBCUs, did not offer doctorates in
mental health or substance use disorder services. “Mainstream” universities with
such programs had long histories of either excluding or drastically limiting
minority admissions, often with legal sanction to do this.
In addition to posing hurdles to minority admissions, a vast majority of
doctoral degree–granting institutions, including medical schools, had few
minority teaching and research faculty, and few program administrators. For
various reasons, these institutions resisted offering any specialized study of
minority behavioral health treatment needs or service issues, either as a distinct
tract or as a component of traditionally offered courses. Perhaps faculty members
were not academically equipped to offer these essentials, or meeting the need for
such personalized educational opportunities for majority and minority students
was not a priority.
Because few minorities participated in behavioral health doctoral programs,
few minorities populated the ranks of faculty at training institutions—as
educators, researchers, or program administrators. Without a network of
empathetic and welcoming professional educators, early MFP coordinators faced
considerable difficulty not only in identifying qualified candidates (that is,
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
minority students already enrolled in, or applying to, doctoral programs), but
also in being able to ensure that those chosen as Fellows would have
opportunities to concentrate on minority behavioral health needs and issues as
part of their doctoral and postdoctoral studies.
CAREER PLACEMENT OPPORTUNITIES. Once MFP Fellows earned their doctorates
or completed postdoctoral studies, the MFP encountered initial challenges in
helping “newly minted” graduates find and secure university faculty
appointments and corresponding participation in university-sponsored
behavioral health research. Many of the early MFP Alumni Fellows became the
first minority behavioral health faculty members or researchers at their
employing institutions and often became the first “beachhead” for future MFP
Fellowship recruitment, retention assistance, and career referrals. Still other MFP
Alumni Fellows with advanced degrees could not find employment, despite the
overwhelming need, and had to relocate to other areas of the country.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
4. Overcoming Initial Challenges:
The Early Years (1973–1992)
O
ver time, the behavioral health associations that participated in the
Minority Fellowship Program (MFP) gradually conquered the
initial challenges described in the previous chapter. Their successes
were due to hard work by small and dedicated MFP staffs, active advisory
committees, association leadership support and resources, and continued federal
commitment and sustained funding, first from the National Institute of Mental
Health (NIMH) and then from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration (SAMHSA).
Changing Cultures and Traditions—Opening New Opportunities
The NIMH decision to administer the MFP through grants to national
associations representing key behavioral health professions proved critical in
overcoming the difficult individual and systemic challenges highlighted above.
Placing MFP responsibility within the professional associations…
 Publicly committed and engaged the leaders and leadership structures of
the most important behavioral health professions in 1) addressing the
historical underrepresentation of racial and ethnic minorities in behavioral
health training, research, practice, and administration; and 2) meeting the
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
mental health and substance use disorder needs of underserved people and
places. As a condition for grant award, professional associations agreed to
locate the MFP at their highest administrative level.
 Signaled to the rest of the behavioral health field that its flagship
organizations and opinion leaders were officially embracing, financially
supporting, and taking the lead in opening new opportunities for minority
participation, leadership, and quality services. Again, as a condition of MFP
funding, associations agreed to contribute financial support and in-kind
assistance.
 Provided MFP coordinators an immediate opportunity to tap longestablished association infrastructures and networks to help with
Fellowship recruitment, retention, and career placement across major
components of each discipline, including doctoral and postdoctoral
professional training and research institutions, clinical practice in public or
private service delivery systems, and professional policy- and standardssetting organizations.
 Facilitated early and sustained interaction of MFP Fellows with other
professionals in their field through MFP–sponsored involvement in national
association activities such as attendance at meetings, conferences, and
seminars, and delivery of research presentations.
 Paved the way for expanded awareness of minority-oriented issues and
needs among the broader membership of participating professional
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
associations, and for the development of complementary association
initiatives to improve organizational and member responsiveness to
minority needs in training, research, service delivery, policy, and program
administration .
 When necessary, enabled MFP coordinators to use the prestige and
influence of their national professional associations and membership to
open doors, change attitudes and practices, encourage supportive
environments and relationships, and make timely, critical connections that
helped early MFP Fellows complete their programs and pursue successful
behavioral health research careers.
Meeting Initial Recruitment Challenges
Pioneering MFP coordinators and Advisory Committee members in each
professional association scoured the nation’s behavioral health graduate schools
and professional association meetings and conferences looking for eligible MFP
Fellowship candidates. Once identified and recruited, special efforts were made
to retain Fellows in the program and help them complete doctoral degrees or
postdoctoral studies. Gradually, all four professional associations initially
participating in the MFP program began to sustain high levels of Fellowship
completion.
As previously indicated, early recruitment of eligible predoctoral or
postdoctoral minority Fellows was not always easy, especially in behavioral
26
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
health disciplines that do not require terminal degrees for careers in clinical
practice, academic teaching, or program administration. Among the four initial
professions supported by the MFP, nursing and social work experienced the
greatest early challenges in identifying and recruiting MFP Fellows. Early nurse
and social work Fellows were often identified and recruited in the few
Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) that offered masters’ and
doctoral degrees in those behavioral health professions, and that could provide
research assistantships or post-graduation employment opportunities. Today,
only two HBCU institutions offer doctoral programs in nursing—Southern
University in Baton Rouge, La., and Hampton University in Hampton, Va.
Although vastly underrepresented in their professions, minority psychiatrists
and psychologists were slightly easier to recruit from among the many medical
schools and training institutions that award doctoral degrees in these disciplines.
Every effort was made by MFP coordinators and others to identify
nonminority academic institutions, individual faculty, staff, or administrators
who might know of, and help recruit, minority doctoral degree candidates who
might qualify for MFP Fellowships. Similar efforts by each behavioral health
discipline sought to expand enrollment opportunities for minority students in
doctoral programs . All the associations involved in the MFP hoped to establish a
broad network of participating institutions, each willing to and capable of
supporting a “critical mass” of MFP Fellows and other minority behavioral
health students.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Each of the four professional associations formed MFP Advisory Committees
to help guide program development and implementation and bring greater
networking experience and capacity to the newly created professional
development initiative. Advisory Committee members often included a mix of
minority and nonminority behavioral health leaders with doctoral degrees
representing careers in education (teaching and administration), research,
policymaking, service delivery, or program administration. Key professional
association administrators and staff, as well as members with interests allied to
the MFP, also served on MFP Advisory Committees. Throughout the history of
the MFP, especially in the early days when both Fellowship candidates and
participating training institutions were in short supply, Advisory Committee
members served as fulltime program promoters and recruiters. They solicited
names from former schoolmates, professional colleagues, and fellow panel
members by phone and, email, through newsletters and other publications, and
at national, regional, state, and local chapter meetings and conferences.
Retaining Fellows in the Program
As previously noted, many early MFP Fellows dropped out of the program
before completing their doctoral studies and dissertations, or their postdoctoral
projects and internships. Early MFP Fellows were often pioneers in their families,
communities, and doctoral degree–granting institutions. A significant number
had academic and other support needs that MFP coordinators came to
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
understand and began to address as the program evolved. Isolation was a key
factor that negatively affected MFP retention. MFP Fellows were frequently the
only minority students in their doctoral or postdoctoral programs.
MFP coordinators quickly established ways to stay connected with Fellows,
and the Fellows connected with one another. Association officials, MFP Advisory
Committee members, faculty at HBCUs and other universities, and eventually
MFP Fellow Alumni, volunteered to serve as one-on-one mentors. Mentors
stayed in constant contact with their assigned Fellows and spent many afterwork or weekend hours on the phone with them, helping reduce their sense of
isolation, and assisting them through academic or personal challenges.
In addition to offering close professional and personal mentoring, all four
associations sponsored frequent activities to keep MFP Fellows engaged and
connected, including MFP–supported attendance at, and participation in,
association conferences, seminars, and workshops. Special MFP orientation,
training, and enrichment programs were conducted to bring Fellows together as
often as possible. Through these efforts, the MFP fostered the beginnings of a
vibrant national network of Fellows and Alumni that would eventually help root
and expand the MFP recruitment, retention, and placement capacity.
Several MFP coordinators utilized the status and convening authority of their
national professional associations in the first years of program funding to help
empower isolated MFP Fellows in their academic settings. Across the initial four
professional association Grantees, MFP Fellows were visited by MFP Advisory
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Committee members at their institutions during the academic year. This practice
helped provide visibility for the MFP’s support of the Fellows, and clarified any
concerns that might have arisen about the Fellow’s course of study, the research,
and or the purpose of the Fellowship. During the early years, the visits played a
substantial and sustaining role in the Fellows’ academic lives.
The American Psychological Association (APA), for example, completed
early site reviews of all schools with MFP Fellows. These high-level visits were
conducted by MFP coordinators and staff, Advisory Committee members, and
nationally recognized leaders in the psychology field who were APA members or
officers. The visits were planned and carefully orchestrated to accomplish many
immediate and longer-term objectives:
1. Shine a positive spotlight on the MFP and the Fellow (or Fellows).
2. Convey to faculty, program administrators, and top university officials a)
the importance that the APA placed on MFP success and b) the need for
them to maintain a socially and academically supportive environment for
MFP Fellows.
3. Model APA confidence in its MFP Fellows by a) arranging for them to
plan all site visit activities including meetings, formal dinners, special
seminars, and informal receptions, and b) inviting academic faculty,
deans, and other administrators to those events.
4. Discuss, and hopefully strengthen, each MFP Fellow’s relationships with
other students, faculty, and program administrators.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
5. Expose school faculty and leadership to minority-oriented mental health
profession instruction models or emerging minority behavioral health
research, and encourage them to initiate or expand such programs at their
institutions.
6. Advocate for increased enrollment of minority undergraduate and
graduate students in all aspects of behavioral health professional training.
Sustaining and Expanding Financial Support
Initial NIMH MFP grants to participating behavioral health professional
associations averaged about $300,000 per year. Grant awards called for financial
support of some 20 to 30 Fellows in each of the four professional associations and
could cover a variety of Fellowship costs, including tuition, living expenses,
travel to MFP–sponsored and other professional training activities, and
participation in professional association meetings and conferences. For the MFP
to sustain cohorts of Fellows and accomplish its professional development
mission, early grants needed to be supplemented from other sources.
All four MFP–sponsoring professional associations made early and sustained
contributions, both financial and non-financial, to ensure that Fellows received
the supports they needed to remain in the program and earn their doctoral
degrees, or complete special studies and projects. The professional associations
often supplemented Federal stipends for tuition and living expenses, and
underwrote travel and participation at professional meetings and conferences.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Association members and professional staff contributed thousands of hours of
time serving on MFP Advisory Committees, identifying and recruiting
Fellowship candidates, reviewing Fellowship applications and selecting
awardees, mentoring individual Fellows, participating in site visits to
professional training institutions, organizing special seminars and institutes,
helping Fellows and MFP Alumni gain career placements, and building a
network of MFP and minority behavioral health “friends” and supporters among
key professional educators, researchers, service providers, and program leaders
in their disciplines.
Beyond contributing their own time and resources to buttress early MFP
efforts, participating professional associations secured financial support from a
variety of other sources, including foundations, corporations, allied-association
professional development initiatives, other federal agencies and programs, and
even the training institutions of MFP Fellows. At first, NIMH required MFP
Fellows to “pay back” some of their Fellowship stipends after MFP completion
so that the program could reinvest these payments to sustain ongoing
operations. This payback requirement ended when MFP administration was
transferred from NIMH to SAMHSA in 1992.
Several MFP Grantees arranged cost-sharing agreements with Fellows’
professional training programs. Such arrangements enabled APA, for example,
to double the number of Fellows supported with initial NIMH grant funds, and
helped create a sense of shared responsibility for Fellow wellbeing and success
32
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
between the association and MFP training institutions. Institutions were
encouraged to monetarily assist MFP Fellows through various mechanisms
traditionally used to support graduate and postgraduate studies, including
matching stipends for living expenses, special training opportunities, travel, and
participation in professional conferences and seminars. Some training
institutions covered all or a portion of MFP Fellow tuition, while others placed
Fellows in paid internship and research assistant positions. To ensure that
institutions did not view MFP funds as a “savings” they could reallocate for
other purposes, APA negotiated that any traditional institutional financial
support these minority students might have otherwise received would be
directed toward increasing recruitment and enrollment of graduate students of
color.
Overcoming Adversity Through Perseverance and
Dedication—MFP Pioneers
The MFP survived its early years of extraordinary challenge and is even
stronger today thanks to the creativity and dedication of program founders.

Dr. Chester Pierce and Dr. James Comer. From Harvard and Yale, these two
eminent psychiatrists led a successful effort in the late 1960s to convince
NIMH to 1) establish a distinct organizational unit focused on the
development of mental health programs for minorities, and 2) design an
affirmative action plan to guide efforts addressing ethnic and racial minority
33
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
mental health needs. Their advocacy ultimately resulted in the creation of the
NIMH Center for Minority Group Mental Health (“Minority Center”) and the
Ethnic Minority Fellowship Program (EMFP).

Dr. James Ralph and Dr. Mary Starke Harper. Dr. Ralph served as the first
Director of the NIMH Minority Center and launched the EMFP, which
awarded its first grants in 1974 and 1975. Dr. Harper served the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services for more than 20 years, becoming
a leader and policymaker with the National Institutes of Health. It was this
role that catapulted her to the helm of the team charged with organizing the
MFP. Her stellar leadership and superb thinking created the foundation for
the MFP and has provided the backbone for its growth and development. She
was the ANA MFP’s first Project Officer, and she established the NIMH
“Minority Center” noted above.

Dr. Dalmas Taylor and Dr. James M. Jones served as MFP Directors at the
American Psychological Association from the programs inception in 1974
until 2005. The two leaders developed innovative strategies for maximizing
the number of MFP Fellows, increasing resources to support the Fellows, and
expanding professional enrichment and exposure opportunities. They
negotiated cost-sharing agreements with the academic institutions of MFP
Fellows. They also used onsite accreditation-style site visits to MFP Fellows
and their schools as a way of conveying APA commitment to the MFP and its
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Fellows, and of promoting greater academic commitment to minority-focused
behavioral health training, research, and service.

Dr. Jeanne Spurlock served as Deputy Medical Director of the American
Psychiatric Association (ApA), from 1975 to 1991. Her pioneering leadership
and advocacy for minority-focused psychiatric research, education, and
assistance to underserved people and places, especially minority women,
helped shape the ApA MFP and other minority-advancement programs
across all behavioral health disciplines.

Dr. Elizabeth Allen, Dr. Ruth Gordon, and Dr. Hattie Bessent. These early
MFP Executive Directors at the American Nurses Association (ANA) created,
nurtured, and helped sustain a fledgling national network of leadership
training and career advancement opportunities for racial and ethnic minority
nurses. Their work deepened greatly the nursing profession’s concentration
on mental health and substance use disorder research and service needs.
Their efforts also generated financial and other supports that enabled the
ANA MFP to increase significantly the number of minority nurses enrolled
in, and completing, doctoral and postdoctoral programs; and foster their rise
to leadership positions in the nursing field.

Carl A. Scott and Dr. E. Aracelis Francis. Between 1974 and 1986, Mr. Scott
created and administered both the research and clinical service MFP
initiatives at the Council on Social Work Education (CWSE). Dr. Francis
served more than 20 years (1986–2007) as Executive Director of the CWSE
35
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
MFP. She became known as the “den mother” to hundreds of minority social
work doctoral students nationwide who stayed in the program and
completed their degrees owing in large part to her seemingly around-theclock availability, reassuring manner, and problem-solving wisdom.
Changing a System in the Midst of System Change, or
‘Jumping Onto a Moving Train’
As if it were not difficult enough between 1973 and 2000 to challenge and
reform behavioral health systems that for generations had excluded minorities
from participation in, and benefit from, mental health research and services,
early MFP leaders also faced a behavioral health world in growing turmoil and
caught in a whirlwind of change. In many respects, trying to gain greater access
and presence in behavior health during that time was like trying to jump onto a
moving train. By the 21st century:

New technologies had begun to exponentially increase our knowledge and
understanding of how the human body functions and malfunctions.
Distinctions between the “nature” and “nurture” theories in behavioral health
started to become both more defined and less clear as we learned more about
the chemistry of brain functioning, the impact of genetics and other biological
factors on mental illness and substance use disorders, and the influence of
background on physical and behavioral health status, strengths, and
vulnerabilities.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Mental health and substance use disorder services and systems were
undergoing fundamental transformations. Starting in 1974, most behavioral
health services began to move from hospitals to community outpatient
settings. Behavioral health care provision and support gradually shifted from
being a private sector responsibility to being a responsibility shared by the
public and private sectors. With that shift came a demand for more public
services with fewer public funds, and for greater program accountability and
evidence of cost effectiveness.

Behavioral health researchers and service providers were quickly coming to
appreciate the number, and the needs, of individuals suffering co-occurring
mental health and substance use disorders, and were beginning to explore,
test, and implement service interventions and protocols of care to meet those
needs.

Roles and relationships among various behavioral health professions engaged
in delivering mental health and substance use disorder care started to become
less rigid, more fluid, and better coordinated to address the needs and goals
of those they served; to respond to shifts in care system structures and
settings; and to accommodate and reflect expanding knowledge and use of
effective prevention, early intervention, and treatment practices, including
the use and administration of psychotropic medications.

And, as the 20th century came to a close, the nation’s demographic makeup
was beginning to change rapidly. In 1974 the United States population was
37
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
overwhelmingly Caucasian, and African Americans were the largest minority
group. Since 1974 the United States has experienced a significant increase
among many minorities, especially Hispanic Americans and Asian
Americans. By 2050 the sum of the nation’s various minority groups—many
now underreached and underserved by behavioral health services—is
projected to become the majority.
These and other evolving, historic shifts and changes continue to intensify the
need for an expanded and more diversified behavioral health system supported
by a workforce of racially and ethnically diverse clinicians, professional
educators, bio-behavioral researchers, and program administrators.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
5. Evolution to Current Programs (1992–2002)
I
n 1992 the U.S. Congress created a new agency within the U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health
Services Administration (SAMHSA), to broaden and strengthen the
national commitment to expand and improve behavioral health services,
especially for underserved people and places. The clinical portion of the
Minority Fellowship Program (MFP) was shifted from the National Institute of
Mental Health (NIMH) to the newly established SAMHSA, and NIMH returned
to its original organizational placement within the National Institutes of Health.
SAMHSA expanded the MFP mission to include Fellowships designed to attract
and train minority doctoral and postdoctoral trainees for leadership careers in
mental health and substance use disorders care, education, policy setting, and
program administration. NIMH continued to provide financial support for
mental health research focused minority Fellowships from 1992 through 2011.
By 2002, most of the early challenges faced by the professional association
Grantees had been resolved, including finding and recruiting eligible Fellowship
candidates, retaining Fellows in the program until they earned doctorates or
completed postdoctoral projects, and helping them begin or renew behavioral
health careers with leadership potential. By 2002, each of the original four
behavioral health professional associations could point to ever growing and
39
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
more connected national networks of successful MFP graduates with doctoral
degrees or scheduled completion of degrees. These networks of MFP graduates,
located in universities and clinical programs nationwide, became a powerful
resource for program recruitment and retention of minority Fellows. MFP
Alumni Fellows served on the program’s national Advisory Committee and on
the Advisory Committees of each professional association Grantee. They
mentored new Fellows, offered career counseling and internship opportunities,
and helped arrange eventual job placements.
Also by 2002, MFPs were reaching or exceeding the 56.6 percent national rate
of doctoral students completing their doctoral degrees. The rates of doctoral
degree completion reported by MFP association Grantees (not including
psychiatrists, who had already completed their terminal advanced degrees—that
is, their medical degrees) were

Psychologists, 70 percent

Nurses, 63 percent

Social workers, 65 percent
An ANA assessment of the first 26 years of MFP Fellowship support (1974–2000),
Celebrating Diversity in Nursing, found that its MFP had achieved the objective of
creating critical masses of minority students among many participating
universities that reduced Fellow isolation and provided opportunities for peerinitiated and peer-supported academic and social enrichment activities. Eleven
40
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
non–Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) each enrolled five or
more ANA MFP Fellows in the same cohort.
41
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
6. Twenty-First Century
Minority Fellowship Programs (2002–12)
O
ver the past decade, Minority Fellowship Programs (MFPs)
administered by the behavioral health professional associations
have continued to improve their capacity to recruit, retain, and
help minority Fellows complete their doctoral programs and pursue leadership
careers in mental health or substance use disorder research and service delivery.
Larger annual awards from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration (SAMHSA) beginning in 2002 have enabled all the MFPs to
increase the number of Fellowship opportunities for eligible minority students,
and augment training and technical assistance activities available to Fellows
during and after their participation in the program.
Following are descriptions of the training and technical assistance
opportunities the five MFP Grantees have created or augmented over the past 10
years:
American Nurses Association
The American Nurses Association (ANA) has put into place an extensive
system of supports to help MFP Fellows complete their doctoral degrees and
start on career paths toward leadership positions in mental health and substance
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
use disorder service delivery, research, program administration, and policy
development.
In addition to tuition assistance, ANA MFP Fellows receive stipends to attend
and present their research at national association conferences, participate in
special summer training institutes, and contribute to SAMHSA–sponsored MFP
meetings and conferences.
To address Fellow retention issues experienced in the early years of the MFP,
such as difficulty with graduate program studies and skills (especially
dissertation writing and presentation), and to increase exposure to career options
and requisite responsibilities, the ANA MFP created a “Virtual University”
composed of the following knowledge- and skill-building activities and
resources:
 Strengthen Writing Skills. The Virtual University offers MFP awardees
supplementary assistance on how to organize and write doctoral
dissertations, research and clinical funding proposals, professional
reports, journal articles, and studies. Strategies and activities include oneon-one coaching, research and statistics study groups, individualized
tutorials, and an MFP Writers Society. This support augments and
reinforces assistance provided by officially “assigned” graduate program
dissertation advisors, and prepares the Fellows for writing tasks
associated with their chosen career paths.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
 Choose and Enter Careers. ANA MFP Fellows in predoctoral graduate
programs are at various stages of their nursing careers. MFP career
counseling concentrates on helping each Fellow identify and pursue
specific knowledge and skills, job opportunities after graduation, and
networking with individuals who could enhance their chosen career path.
The Virtual University also assists Fellows who have not committed to a
specific career path by linking them with nurses and other behavioral
health experts through a series of small seminars, intensive summer and
winter institutes, one-on-one site visits, and opportunities to attend
particular national and international meetings and conferences.
 Learn and Practice Networking. The ANA MFP has a long and strong
tradition of helping Fellows learn and utilize the power of networking and
peer support. As previously indicated, the network of ANA MFP Alumni
has proven to be a unique and valuable source of guidance and assistance
to Fellows pursuing their doctoral degrees, and to those who have
completed the program and entered or resumed careers. ANA MFP
Alumni help minority nurses with doctorates find jobs, achieve leadership
positions, and participate in critical field- and knowledge-advancing
research and clinical program development.
 Form Cross-Cultural Bonds. The ANA MFP makes a special effort to
expand Fellows’ exposure to, and bonding with, minority Fellows from
other racial, cultural, or ethnic backgrounds. Fellows are assigned cross44
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
cultural roommates at meetings and conferences, and are encouraged to
participate in cross-cultural team-building activities to “incubate” new
awareness and friendships. The MFP network of past, current, and future
MFP Fellows is truly a “universal” network, and not a set of subnetworks
organized and maintained along racial or ethnic lines. For example,
publishable papers on the life courses of depression in children and
adolescents of many backgrounds are being developed as a result of the
incubation process that occurred among Asian American, Hispanic
American, American Indian, and African American Fellows.
 Experience Career Paths and Opportunities. The “Virtual University”
helps arrange internships for ANA MFP Fellows in four core behavioral
health nursing leadership career paths: research administration, policy
development, professional development, and clinical program
administration. Fellows interested in behavioral health research careers
may elect to intern with a nurse administrator of applied or clinical
research in mental health and/or substance use disorder prevention and
treatment. Possible locations for such internships include the graduate
institutions housing predoctoral programs at which Fellows are enrolled.
Fellows also can be placed with other universities, with participating
programs of the Clinical Trial Network of the National Institute on Drug
Abuse (NIDA), or with nurse-directed programs administered by other
SAMHSA, NIDA, or National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) research
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Grantees. The ANA MFP maintains an up-to-date listing of internship
opportunities and conducts ongoing outreach to expand the list. Fellows
intending to pursue nursing careers in behavioral health policy
development may intern in public or private agencies that set policies for
behavioral health nursing. These internships may include summer or
semester placements in settings such as the following:
 Federal executive branch agencies (SAMHSA, NIDA, NIMH, the Office
of the Secretary of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Public
Health Service, the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services,
and the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy); the
U. S. Congress (offices of individual House or Senate members and
staffs of relevant committees)
 State agencies (state mental health and/or substance use disorder
agencies, state health care and insurance regulating agencies, and
state legislators or legislative committees)
 Local agencies ( mental health, substance use disorder, and/or
primary care authorities as well as commissions within local
government and offices of elected local officials).
Fellows interested in pursuing nursing careers in professional
development may intern with administrators of their own graduate
programs or with training programs at other institutions within ANA or
other nurse and/or professional associations dedicated to mental health
46
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
and substance use disorder treatment (e.g., the American Psychiatric
Association, the American Psychological Association), or with companies
that develop and offer continuing education credits. Fellows training to
become clinical program administrators may be placed with
administrators of community-based standalone or primary care programs
that provide mental health or substance use disorder prevention and
treatment services, such as the following:
 Federally funded community health centers (especially those that
serve underserved people in urban or rural settings)
 Publicly supported mental health and substance use disorder
treatment programs, school-based prevention programs
 Public and private hospitals with mental health and substance use
disorder services
 Private mental health and substance use disorder treatment centers
 Workplace programs (emphasizing wellness, and mental health
and substance use disorder intervention and treatment)
The 21st century ANA MFP has made considerable use of the Internet to
expand and enrich its support of Fellows and program graduates. The program
maintains an interactive website that enables much of the one-to-one mentoring
of Fellows to be conducted online. More often than not, mentors do not live in
the same communities, or work in the same institutions, as the Fellows they are
mentoring. Similarly, the Web serves as a portal for multiperson “conversations,”
47
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
such as peer-review sessions of dissertation drafts or team statistical analysis
assistance. The website links Fellows to the ANA–organized and maintained
Virtual Library of professional reference materials.
The ANA has created a Statistics Study Group (SSG) that assists Fellows with
the mastery of research design and statistical analysis. Beginning in fall 2012, the
SSG will be available to all Fellows and will feature access to taped lectures, a
chat room, a Classroom Without Quizzes, and a series of links directing Fellows
to resources from major universities that have posted their lecture series online.
American Psychiatric Association
The American Psychiatric Association (ApA) Minority Fellowship Program
has evolved into two primary components:
1. A 1- to 2-year postdoctoral Fellowship for minority psychiatry residents
2. Specialized programs for minority medical students
Through these two components, MFP Fellows receive exposure to and training in

Racial and ethnic disparities in psychiatric and substance use disorder
care and culturally competent techniques to address those disparities

Minority-focused psychiatric and substance use disorder research,
including timely research-generated identification of evidence-based
treatment models that improve the quality and cultural competence of
health care to racial and ethnic minorities
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Community outreach to local leaders and persons with mental health and
substance use disorders, with the goal of tailoring services to the specific
needs of minorities
MFP RESIDENT FELLOWSHIPS. MFP Resident Fellowships support 1- to 2-year
postdoctoral projects that emphasize cultural competence in psychiatry or
related issues of concern to minorities. The ApA MFP Selection/Advisory
Committee and MFP staff provide technical assistance to Fellows in identifying
project topics and work with them through the process of project design,
implementation, evaluation, and documentation.
MFP Resident Fellows receive many additional supports while conducting
their special studies, including

Mentoring. A National Minority Mentors Network matches small groups of
minority Fellows with experienced psychiatrists engaged in careers that
can both enrich and inform the special projects undertaken by the Fellows,
as well as help guide career planning.

Leadership Training. The ApA conducts leadership training for MFP
Resident Fellows through regularly scheduled seminars, workshops, and
scientific programs at annual ApA conventions; and at ApA council
business and policy meetings conducted each fall. These training activities
 Help prepare Fellows to be accountable and responsible for, and to
manage and oversee, mental health and substance use disorder care
for minority people
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
 Strengthen Fellow communication and advocacy skills
 Expose Fellows to behavioral health leaders engaged in service
delivery and administration, policy setting, and health services
research
 Introduce recovery-oriented principles and practices presented by
psychiatrists and behavioral health care recipients

Education and Networking Opportunities. As previously indicated, MFP
Resident Fellows receive support to attend professional meetings. These
include the ApA annual convention, the ApA Institute on Psychiatric
Services that focuses on community-based psychiatry, minority-specific
meetings (e.g., the Association of American Indian Physicians, the Asian–
Pacific American Medical Student Association, the National Medical
Association, Black Psychiatrists of America), national subspecialty
organization meetings (e.g., geriatric, child, forensic, addiction
psychiatry), and various meetings of ApA Councils (e.g., the Council on
Addiction Psychiatry, the Council on Minority Mental Health and Health
Disparities, the Council on Psychiatry and the Law) where Fellows may be
assigned to special Council projects at the request of Council chairs.

Community Outreach. ApA MFP Resident Fellows receive support to
participate in special community outreach activities, including the ApA
program Office of Minority and National Affairs (OMNA) Tour, which
engages local communities in behavioral health planning to meet the
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
needs of diverse racial and ethnic minorities; and the Doctors Back to
School Program, which visits local high schools to encourage minority
students’ interest in pursuing education and careers in medicine and
psychiatry.
SPECIALIZED PROGRAMS FOR MINORITY MEDICAL STUDENTS. Additional funding
from SAMHSA in recent years has enabled the ApA to offer three special
psychiatric training programs to minority students enrolled in medical schools
who are working toward their doctor of medicine degrees. These predoctoral
programs encourage minority medical students to specialize in psychiatry and
focus their careers on addressing the needs of diverse racial and ethnic minorities
in underserved communities. Specialized programs supported by the MFP are
1. Travel scholarships to attend an ApA Annual Meeting
2. Opportunities for minority medical students to participate in summer
mentoring programs with psychiatrists in clinical settings
3. Opportunities for minority medical students to serve a 1-month clinical
rotation in HIV community-based psychiatric treatment settings
4. Opportunities for minority medical students to engage in 1-month clinical
mentoring internships with psychiatrists specializing in substance use
disorder prevention or treatment
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
American Psychological Association
The American Psychological Association (APA) MFP has evolved over the
past 10 years into three components similar to those described for ApA: 1)
mental health and substance use disorder predoctoral Fellowships, 2) mental
health and substance use disorder postdoctoral Fellowships, and 3) psychology
summer institutes.
The Predoctoral Fellowship in Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services
Program offers stipends to doctoral degree students expressing an interest in
pursuing training and careers focused on the behavioral health needs of diverse
racial and ethnic groups. These stipends are designed to support the completion
of course work, dissertations, and degrees. Initiated after SAMHSA increased
MFP funds in 2002, the Postdoctoral Fellowship in Mental Health and Substance
Abuse Services Program provides 1- to 2-year stipends to minorities and others
who have earned their doctoral degrees in psychology within the past 5 years
and who wish to pursue specialized study in minority-focused behavioral health
service delivery, education, or program administration.
Predoctoral and postdoctoral Fellows attend APA association meetings and
conferences (including the APA Annual Convention) and special MFP events.
The MFP conducts Dissertation Symposiums at each Annual Convention, during
which up to five Fellows present their dissertation research and findings to APA
members. Just before each APA Annual Convention, the APA holds a special 2day orientation workshop for new Fellowship cohorts, the Professional
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Development Workshop (PDW). The PDWs bring together hundreds of
participants, including new, current, and former MFP Fellows, APA MFP staff,
and other APA officials. The PDWs offer a variety of educational, social, and
networking experiences, including
1. Workshops and presentations that orient new Fellows to their APA MFP
programs, provide information on additional funding opportunities from
various public and private sources, describe APA activities in public
interest and public policy, review ethical guidelines, and share tips on
how to succeed in their training programs and careers
2. An awards session and social hour during which accomplished MFP
Fellow Alumni are recognized, current and former Fellows network and
form initial bonds, and selected poster abstracts of MFP Fellow doctoral
dissertations or postdoctoral studies are displayed
3. A Topical Symposium that increases MFP Fellow awareness and
understanding of contemporary behavior health issues and challenges of
reaching and serving diverse racial and ethnic minorities
In addition to predoctoral and postdoctoral Fellowship awards, the APA
MFP now offers stipends for advanced doctoral degree psychology students and
early career doctoral recipients, including MFP Fellows, to attend an annual MFP
Psychology Summer Institute (PSI). The PSI program was established in 2003 as a
direct result of increased MFP funding from SAMHSA and NIMH. Each PSI
provides a weeklong opportunity for participants to engage in didactic and
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
hands-on learning experiences. PSI students are mentored by leading
psychologists involved in various aspects of minority-focused mental health and
substance use disorder treatment, including service delivery, research, education,
and program administration. PSI students engage in discussions with these
mentors, many of whom are MFP Alumni, in both formal and informal settings.
PSI training sessions offer information on cutting-edge research, advanced
statistical methods, and evidence-based mental health and substance use
disorder treatment models. Representatives from a variety of federal agencies,
often MFP Alumni, conduct workshops and meet with participants to share
information on agency priorities, programs, and grant opportunities.
Council on Social Work Education
The purpose of the Council on Social Work Education’s (CSWE’s) MFP is to
improve behavioral health services and outcomes for racial and ethnic
minorities. The program seeks to accomplish this purpose by expanding the
diversity of the behavioral health workforce, increasing the number of racial and
ethnic minority doctoral-level social work professionals with expertise in
culturally competent behavioral health services.
The CWSE MFP awards Fellowships to doctoral students of social work who
have a Master in Social Work (MSW) degree and who are preparing for
leadership, teaching, consulting, training, policy development, and
administrative roles involving mental health and substance use disorder services
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
to underrepresented and underserved people and communities. The Fellows
bring a passion for effective service delivery to these underserved communities.
The program is designed to ensure the Fellows’ active participation in the
planning, development, implementation, and evaluation of mental health and
substance use disorder programs that provide culturally competent services to
racial and ethnic minorities.
The CSWE MFP builds and maintains a community of minority Fellows with
a strong professional identity of dedication to minority behavioral health and
health disparity issues as well as a sense of responsibility to give back and
mentor others from underserved and underrepresented groups. Recent MFP
Fellows have indicated a desire to pursue social work leadership careers in such
areas as mental health policy and systems transformation, the relationship of
poverty to mental health, trauma and violence in minority communities, and
issues of minority youth transitioning out of foster care.
CSWE MFP Fellows receive many benefits and supports during their
Fellowship period. These include the following:

Stipend and Other Financial Supports. Each Fellow receives a monthly
stipend for living expenses as well as other financial assistance.
Depending on funding availability, financial support may be provided to
help with tuition, with the costs of attending professional conferences and
symposia specific to a Fellow’s area of interest, or with degree completion
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
expenses such as writing services, transcriptions services, or the purchase
of data sets/data analysis software.

Program Information and Conference Calls. Each Fellowship year begins
with an orientation conference call for new Fellows and a general
conference call for all Fellows that are designed to begin development of
the MFP Fellows community. Fellows receive a handbook of information
on MFP requirements, expectations, and important dates; as well as a
directory of Fellows that gives Fellows’ contact information and areas of
interest. The directory enables the Fellows to identify Fellows at other
schools who might have similar interests and wish to collaborate on
publications and research.
In addition, Fellows participate in monthly conference calls. During these
calls, MFP staff share program updates, information on MFP resources,
and other relevant Fellowship news. They encourage discussion on topics
important to the social work profession and to mental health and
substance use disorder services (e.g., cultural competence, behavioral
health disparities). The conference calls also allow the Fellows to interact
with one another, ask questions, share personal experiences or challenges,
and seek the advice of the Director and other Fellows concerning their
doctoral process. As the Fellows are in universities all over the country,
the monthly calls provide one key avenue for obtaining the social support
essential to maintaining a sense of community.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Email Communication. Ongoing email communication that includes a
Weekly Dish email celebrating Fellows’ doctoral milestones, and that
provides information such as calls for papers, conference reminders, and
news regarding behavioral health resources and position openings. Deans
and directors of schools of social work often send information about their
faculty and postdoctoral recruitment openings for dissemination to
current and Alumni Fellows.

Mentoring and Peer Support. The MFP Director provides ongoing
mentoring to Fellows through the monthly conference calls, at one-on-one
telephone conferences, and during in-person meetings at MFP–sponsored
conferences. Mentoring is also available from members of the CSWE MFP
Advisory Committee who are themselves program Alumni. Mentoring
includes guidance on navigating the challenges of the doctoral process,
dissertation and data collection, interviewing, and job selection. Peer
support among the Fellows is encouraged during the monthly conference
calls, at MFP networking sessions scheduled at conferences, and through
informal contacts between Fellows at the same university or in the same
state or region.

Conference Attendance. MFP Fellows attend, and participate in, CSWE’s
Annual Program Meeting (APM), which includes MFP–specific activities.
The APM offers Fellows the opportunity to deliver oral or poster
presentations of their work, and to attend workshops and symposia on a
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
variety of topics (such as culturally competent practice, evidence-based
practice, working with military families, issues specific to underserved
minorities). Depending on funding availability, Fellows also attend the
Society for Social Work and Research Annual Conference, the social work
profession’s premier national research conference. At this event, Fellows
have opportunities to attend workshops and presentations on the most
current trends in social work research. CSWE MFP–sponsored activities
are often scheduled during this conference. Fellows also have
opportunities to present their own work in either oral or poster
presentations.
In addition to the APM conference workshops and opportunities for
presentations, the CSWE MFP holds its own separate events and training
session. Events include an orientation session for new Fellows and a
general networking session with all Fellows to allow the cohort of Fellows
to get to know one another and the MFP staff. The training session
involves presentations by MFP Alumni and other noted social work
professionals as well as experiential learning activities. Some of the topics
covered during recent sessions have been collaborating/networking,
career development, grant writing/grant management, surviving the
doctoral process, and the future of social work. One example of an
experiential learning activity involved a mock interviewing exercise with
three Fellows and an MFP Alumni panel. This exercise was followed by
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
lively feedback and discussion from the Alumni panel as well as other
Alumni present that benefited all Fellows in attendance. Another recent
interactive activity was the Speed Mentoring session involving current
Fellows and Alumni. MFP Alumni were recruited to serve as Speed
Mentors, and each Fellow received a 15-minute mentoring session with
two different Alumni. Alumni volunteers and Fellows were matched
based on area of research or nature of the Fellow’s mentoring question.
This activity received very positive feedback from both Fellows and
Alumni volunteer mentors.

Specialized Training. The CSWE MFP has begun using Webinars to
increase the number of training opportunities available to Fellows. The
MFP has offered two Webinars in 2012: “Emerging Trends in RecoveryOriented Treatment” and “Assessing for and Addressing Trauma in
Recovery-Oriented Practice.” The Webinars included both training and
discussion. Webinar technology will be used to increase opportunities for
Fellows to conduct presentations on their research and in their areas of
specialization. In past years, specialized training has also included
participation in a Cultural Competency Institute and a Summer Institute
on African American Aging Research.
As Fellows complete their Fellowship period, they transition to CSWE’s MFP
Alumni Network. Since its inception in 1974, CSWE’s MFP has provided support
to just over 600 social work Fellows (funded by both SAMHSA and NIMH). This
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
national network of program Alumni represents a lifelong community of peers
and colleagues who continue to collaborate and support one another in career
advancement, publications, research, and conference presentations. Through the
Alumni listserv, MFP networking opportunities at CSWE’s Annual Program
Meeting, and other ongoing communication, MFP Fellowship Alumni are
enlisted to help with the recruiting, mentoring, and training of MFP Fellows. The
Alumni E-News Connection, an email communication with Fellowship Alumni, is
used to celebrate Alumni career accomplishments; it also provides information
on grant opportunities, noteworthy conferences, position openings, and available
behavioral health resources.
American Association of Marriage and Family Therapy
The American Association of Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT)
received its first SAMHSA MFP Grant in 2008. The MFP provides doctoral
Fellowships for up to 3 years to eligible doctoral degree students in accredited
marriage and family therapy training programs to help cover the costs of
doctoral program attendance and training. A new Dissertation Completion
Fellowship, being offered for the first time in 2012 and on a limited basis,
provides support for 1 year to students who have completed all requirements for
their doctoral degrees but have not completed their dissertations.
In addition to predoctoral education support, the AAMFT MFP conducts a
series of training and enrichment activities for MFP Fellows and others who
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
apply for, and receive, special travel stipends. These activities are designed to
expand their awareness and understanding of broader human and societal issues
that may affect their capacity to meet the behavioral health needs of minorities as
therapists, educators, researchers, or program administrators. The activities
include the following:

Quarterly electronic conferences. Quarterly Webinars are convened
through conference calls or SMARTBOARD technology. MFP Fellows and
other participants, drawn from a variety of backgrounds and expertise
(such as neuroscience, economics, anthropology, women’s studies), create
interesting dialogs and greater understanding of the confluence and
interaction of many family and life systems that 1) relate to the needs and
conditions individuals and families from diverse racial and ethnic
backgrounds and 2) might enlighten interventions to address those needs
and conditions. The Webinars help prepare participants for the
Semiannual Think Tanks described below.

Semiannual think tanks. Two 3-day think tanks are conducted annually,
one in the winter and one in the summer. Both sessions bring together
MFP Fellows and the aforementioned distinguished scholars from a
variety of fields to
1. Discuss how the discipline of Marriage and Family Therapy
connects with, and is committed to, innovative interdisciplinary
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
work in the areas of cultural competence and substance use
disorder prevention/intervention
2. Explore cutting-edge topics that are “at the intersection of five
knowledge domains: Culture, Knowledge, and Power (Cultural
Competency); Community Health (Substance Use Disorder
Prevention/Intervention); Social Ecology/Social Justice; Culture
and Context in Marriage and Family Therapy; and Public
Interest/Public Policy”
National Board for Certified Counselors
Professional counseling is the newest behavioral health profession to join
the SAMHSA MFP. The National Board for Certified Counselors and Affiliates
(NBCC) received its first MFP grant award in August 2012. The goal of the NBCC
MFP is to strengthen the infrastructure that engages diverse individuals in the
counseling profession and increases the number of professional counselors
skilled in providing culturally appropriate, effective services to underserved
people and communities. The NBCC MFP is administered by the NBCC
Foundation, a corporate affiliate that offers master’s level scholarships for
counselors in training.
The NBCC MFP consists of two major components:

Fellowships for qualified doctoral students, and
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Continuing education courses in culturally appropriate practices that will
be available to all National Certified Counselors (NCCs)
MFP Fellowships. Working in partnership with national organizations and
accredited master’s degree programs, the NBCC will strategically promote, and
will provide, up to 24 one-year fellowships per year for minority students
pursuing their doctorates in counseling. Each fellowship will consist of a
principal award amount and additional stipends for expenses related to
additional study.
Core requirements for fellowship eligibility include the NCC credential;
enrollment in a doctoral program accredited by the Council for Accreditation of
Counseling and Related Education Programs; demonstrated knowledge of, and
experience with, racial and ethnic minorities; and commitment to providing
mental health and substance use disorder services to underserved minorities.
The fellowships will enable participants to obtain additional training in mental
and substance use disorder services, and specialty training in culturally
competent service delivery. Both types of training will be designed to support
the Fellows in providing leadership to the counseling profession through
education, research, and clinical practice benefiting vulnerable, underserved
people and communities.
Continuing Education Courses in Culturally Appropriate Practices. The MFP
will provide new continuing education courses on culturally appropriate
practices to the more than 50,000 NCCs through the NBCC’s online continuing
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
education platform and through conferences. The new courses will extend
training in culturally appropriate practices that already is a required element of
accredited counseling education programs nationwide. The course audience will
include, but will not be limited to, minority NCCs. The NBCC expects that MFP
Fellow Alumni will contribute to the continuing education courses in culturally
appropriate practices, once one or two cohorts have completed their fellowships.
Two groups of seasoned professionals are providing guidance to the
NBCC MFP: the MFP Advisory Council (MFPAC), and doctoral-level mentors.
The MFPAC was created to help select Fellows and offer consultation to the
program. The Council is composed of three experts in the counseling profession
with experience offering mental health and substance use disorder services to
underserved minorities, and one public member who has experience as a
consumer of mental health counseling services. The inaugural chair of the
MFPAC is Dr. Sandra Lopez–Baez, professor, Counseling and Educational
Leadership, Montclair State University (Montclair, N.J.) The NBCC MFP also has
engaged experienced doctoral-level counselors as mentors to support the Fellows
in their training and leadership efforts.
Minority Fellowship Program Coordinating Center
In 2008, SAMHSA created a Minority Fellowship Program Coordinating
Center, which is managed under contract by Development Services Group, Inc.
The Coordinating Center is designed to help SAMHSA and the MFP professional
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
association Grantees strengthen communications across the program, share and
improve MFP operations, better track MFP Fellows and Alumni, assess the
effects of the MFP, and in general help the MFP solidify its gains and make
further progress in reducing racial and ethnic disparities in the behavioral health
workforce and system of care.
Under SAMHSA’s direction, the Coordinating Center is serving as a convener
of the six participating MFPs and is helping the Grantees begin to shape an
agenda for applying the many knowledge and networking resources the MFP
has developed over its four-decade history to current minority behavioral care
issues. The Coordinating Center helped SAMHSA plan and conduct the first
federally sponsored National MFP Conference in 2011. At this event, current and
Alumni MFP Fellows shared their experiences with program administrators and
behavioral health leaders across participating disciplines, and provided input to
SAMHSA and its Grantees on how to improve current and future MFP
programming.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
7. Program Indicators of Success
E
ach of the MFP association Grantees has, from time to time, collected
and aggregated information on the racial and ethnic demography of
its MFP Fellows, the rates of success in completing doctoral degrees,
and the nature of postdoctoral career experiences and contributions to its
respective behavioral health field. A SAMHSA/MFP Grantee effort is currently
under way through the Coordinating Center to expand and standardize MFP
goals and objectives across behavioral health disciplines, to develop and apply
common data collection instruments and protocols, and to generate MFP–wide
outcome data for use in program evaluation, reporting, and planning.
In the interim, available information from MFP Grantees points to aggregated
successes in -1. Increasing the number of minorities attracted to, and engaged in,
behavioral health professional careers
2. Ensuring that minority students complete doctoral degrees needed to
pursue leadership positions in behavioral health professional education,
research, clinical practice and service delivery, program administration,
and policy setting
3. Building a network of minority behavioral health professionals in each
discipline that will continue to expand, so as to provide a culturally
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
competent workforce able to address the behavioral health needs of
diverse racial and ethnic minorities in underserved communities
Ethnic and Racial Demographics of MFP Fellows Completing the
Program
Similar information from MFP coordinators collected at different times in
recent years indicates that MFP Fellows of the four initial behavioral health
disciplines supported by the MFP reflect a broad cross-section of the nation’s
racial and ethnic minorities.
Table 7.1 lists the percentages of racial and ethnic minorities in the MFPs for
nursing, psychology, psychiatry, and social work, out of the total number of
Fellows in each discipline who completed doctoral degrees or study programs.
Columns may not add up to 100 percent because programs were open to, and
admitted, nonminority students demonstrating by experience or study their
commitment to careers in minority-focused research, clinical practice or
administration, professional education or policy development. Data are not yet
available for the Marriage and Family Therapy MFP, because this program was
initially funded in 2008, and for the National Board for Certified Counselors
MFP, because this program was funded in August 2012.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Racial/Ethnic
Minority
Nursinga
Table 7.1
Psychologyb
Psychiatryc
Social Workd
African American
Hispanic
American/Latino
Asian American
Native American
Other
54%
17%
43%
31%
48%
18%
51%
26%
8%
11%
5%
16%
7%
1%
28%
2%
4%
19%
4%
0%
aDraft
American Nurses Association history, 2010; 2001–2001, n=72.
Psychological Association Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology 15(4):388–99; 1976–
2006, n=451.
cAmerican Psychiatric Association chart of MFP Fellows; 1975–2011, n=404.
dCouncil on Social Work Education 2010/2011 Annual Report; 1976–2010, n=400.
bAmerican
Program Completion Rates
As previously indicated, the three longstanding MFP programs that
support minority student completion of doctoral degree programs (the American
Nurses Association, the American Psychological Association, and the Council on
Social Work Education) have achieved completion rates higher than the national
Ph.D. completion average of 56.6 percent among all disciplines, as determined by
a 7-year study released in 2008 by the Council for Graduate Education, Pfizer
Inc., and the Ford Foundation. According to association MFP Grantees, rates of
doctoral degree completion for MFP Fellows are approximately 63 percent
among nurses, 70 percent among psychologists, and 68 percent among social
workers.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Careers in Mental Health and Substance Use Disorders
Some MFP Grantees have kept track of careers chosen by graduating
Fellows. Data gathered for a 2010 history of the ANA MFP indicate that a
significant majority of MFP nurse Fellows graduating from the program between
2001 and 2010 with doctoral degrees are pursuing careers in research and
teaching. Figure 7.1 depicts single and multiple career paths among the 72 ANA
MFP graduates:
Figure 7.1. 2001–10 MFP Fellow Careers
60
51
50
40
30
20
10
7
7
7
5
6
0
Research
Teaching
Research
Administration
Clinical
Service
Clinical
Administration
Policy
Development
Community
Involvement
Similar distributions of career paths have been reported by other MFP
coordinators, which underscores how successful the MFP has been in creating a
69
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
solid and lasting critical mass of minority educators, researchers, and clinicians.
These former Fellows are continuing to generate minority-oriented knowledge
that is being taught and used by an ever-expanding workforce of culturally
competent service providers, program administrators, and public policy setters.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
8. MFP Contributions to
Behavioral Health Knowledge
A
s with data collection and reporting, the MFP Grantees maintain
different types of information on current and former MFP Fellows.
Some Grantees collect and aggregate information periodically
from Fellows regarding their current career status or career changes, publications
in professional journals, published books or manuscripts, presentations at
meetings and conferences, or other contributions to behavioral health knowledge
and service. Some associations are just beginning to gather and retain such
information in ways that can be used to assess program effectiveness and
accomplishments. For example, the American Psychiatric Association assembled
a list of the knowledge-building activities of current MFP Fellows during 2010–
11. In addition, the American Nurses Association (ANA) compiled a list of
selected dissertations of ANA nurse Fellows who earned their doctoral degrees
between 2002 and 2010. These data provide selected indicators of MFP
contributions to behavioral health knowledge regarding the needs of diverse
racial and ethnic minorities, and ways to address these needs more effectively.
Knowledge-Building Activities of MFP Psychiatry Fellows, 2010–11
CLINICAL
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Developing a primary care/mental health collaborative clinic at Children’s Hospital,
Washington, D.C. [Dr. Ashley Miller]

Established group and family counseling clinics [Dr. Kenyatta Jones]
COMMUNITY AND ADVOCACY

Working on a list of Asian American mental health resources for the San Francisco Bay
Area to be published on Web [Dr. Jason Cheng]

Planned a contingency management program for a methadone clinic [Dr.
Elvin Hernandez]

Conducting mental health screening and psychoeducational sessions
(“Wellness Tent”) as part of the Institute of Women and Ethnic Studies
[Dr. Kimberly Gordon]

Organized renovation at the homeless clinic of St. Vincent de Paul in
downtown San Diego, Calif., to reflect the cultures of the patients we
serve [Dr. Melissa Deer]
CONSULTATION AND GUIDANCE

Partnered with the San Diego American Indian Health Center to address
mental health needs of urban American Indians [Dr. Melissa Deer]
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
CONFERENCES AND MEETINGS

American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Meeting [Dr.
Vanessa Bobb]

World Congress for Social Psychiatry: presented short
documentary ”Release to Life: True Stories of Coming Home After
Incarceration” [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

American Group Psychotherapy Association [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting: presented during a
symposium on “Brief Psychotherapies for Survivors of Cancer” [Dr. Yavar
Moghimi]

Society for the Study of Psychiatry and Culture [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

Poster presentation, “Designing and Implementing a Curriculum on
Cultural Sensitivity,” at the American Association of Directors of
Psychiatry Residency Training [Dr. Amelia Villagomez]

Participated in the American Association of Child & Adolescent
Psychiatry’s (AACAP’s) Annual Advocacy Day on Capitol Hill [Dr.
Ranjan Avashti, Dr. Sarah Vinson]

Presented at the American Association of Directors of Psychiatry
Residency Training [Dr. Juliet Glover]
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Organized “Career Development for Mental Health Professionals” at the
Texas Regional Psychiatry Minority Mentor Network Retreat, August
2010 [Dr. Nubia Lluberes]

Organized First Annual Greater Washington Trauma and Torture
Survivor Network Conference, “Creating a Coalition of Care for
Trauma and Torture Survivors,” Washington, D.C. [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

Helped organize, and contributed to, a 1-day conference on
Developmental Trauma Disorder and gave presentations to Psychiatry
Residents at Beth Israel Medical Center Annual Cultural Competency Fair
[Dr. Nicole Zuber]

Planned annual Cultural Diversity Day, University of Maryland, “Beyond
the Orange Jumpsuit: The Culture of Incarceration” [Dr. Billina Shaw]

Planned Muslim Mental Health Conference [Dr. Jose Herrera]
CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT/EVALUATIONS

Developed a new treatment strategy for a methadone clinic that serves
minority patients [Dr. Elvin Hernandez]

Created a Cultural Competency Spanish Language Course for psychiatry
residents [Dr. Judith Joseph]
EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES

Organized resident dinner with invited speaker from University of
California, Davis, on culture in medicine [Dr. Jason Cheng]
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Gave a talk on local Survivors of Torture program for residents and
faculty from Stanford, at the University of California, San Francisco
(UCSF), and other Bay Area programs, as well as those in private practice
[Dr. Jason Cheng]

Participated in UCSF Pathway in Health Professions Education [Jason
Cheng]

Integrating culture into the psychiatric emergency services [Dr. Billina
Shaw]

Organized “Beyond the Melting Pot: Promoting Community Resilience in
the Face of Trauma” conference [Dr. Nubia Lluberes]

Organized first annual Washington, D.C., Metro Network of Healing for
Torture and Trauma Survivors [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

Buprenorphine training, University of Puerto Rico [Dr. Elvin Hernandez]

Organized a “Cognitive–Behavioral Therapy Training Program” for
school therapists and mental health workers at St. Vincent and the
Grenadines [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]

Organized grand rounds to address racism in the therapeutic relationship
and racial differences and violence [Dr. Anique Forrester]

Organized a public and global mental health symposium [Dr. Judith
Joseph]

Organized a Mindfulness Stress Reduction course at the Hispanic Clinic
[Dr. Amelia Villagomez]
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT

Created a cultural psychiatry library [Dr. Nicole Zuber]

Organized orientation lectures on cultural competence—Resident lunch:
“Psychiatry in the Dominican Republic” and Lectures:
“Ethnopsychopharmacology” by Dr. David
Henderson and “The Art and Science of Disaster Psychiatry” by Dr. Craig
Katz [Dr. Tresha Gibbs]

Presented Grand Rounds Clinical Case Conference at Queens Children
Psychiatric Center [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]

Organized clinical case consultations through video conferencing between
mental health clinicians in St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Psychiatric
Institute, New York City [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]
MEDIA

Short documentary “Release to Life: True Stories of Coming Home After
Incarceration” [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

Submission to multiple festivals (Seattle, Wash., International Film
Festival, American Film Institute SilverDocs) [Dr. Yavar Moghimi]

Documentary on mental health awareness among pregnant teenagers [Dr.
Judith Joseph]

Website created about black mental health for both consumers and
clinicians, www.blackmentalhealthnet.com [Dr. Sarah Vinson]
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MENTORING AND RECRUITMENT

Organized a “Doctors Back to School” program for high school students
[Pennsylvania, Dr. Anique Forrester; Washington, D.C., Dr. Ashley Miller;
New York, N.Y., Dr. Tresha Gibbs]

Distributed information on psychiatry at the Latino Medical Student
Association [Dr. Guillermo Portillo and Dr. Jeremy Martinez]
PRESENTATIONS AT CONFERENCES AND MEETINGS

Panelist for session on health careers at Region 4 Student National
Medical Association conference hosted by Morehouse School of Medicine
[Dr. Sarah Vinson]

Conducted a culturally competent self-esteem workshop for African
American and Latino youth at Harlem Children’s Zone Afterschool
Program, New York, N.Y. [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]

Co-chair, APA Workshop, “Culture, DSM–5, Minority Populations and
Training in Psychiatry” [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]

Co-sponsor, Symposium, “Black Women’s Mental Health,” Westchester,
N.Y., June 2011 [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]

Presentation at Western Psychological Association meeting in Beijing,
China, and at APA meeting in Hawaii [Dr. Sonia Krishna]

Black Psychiatrists of America, Transcultural Conference, St. Thomas, U.S.
Virgin Islands, presented research [Dr. Monique Upton and Dr. Kimberly
Gordon]
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
Presented workshops with Fellows at American Psychiatric Association
2010 Institute on Psychiatric Services Meeting, “Interpersonal Violence in
a Cross-Cultural Context” [Monique Upton, Ranjan Avasthi, and Sosunmolu
Shoyinka]; “Cultural and Linguistic Matching Patient to Provider: Pros and
Cons” [Dr. Jackie Smith and Dr. Farha Abbassi]

Presented a workshop on cultural competency, Beijing, China [Dr. Judith
Joseph, Dr. Sonia Krishna]

Presented Media Workshop: “Madly Gifted,” May 2011 Annual Meeting
in Honolulu, Hawaii. [Dr. Nubia Lluberes]

Presented “Criminal Justice and the Mentally Ill,” Texas Regional
Psychiatry Minority Mentor Network in March 2011 [Nubia Lluberes]

Faculty and resident workshop on culture and the psychodynamic
formulation with Dr. Salman Akhtar [Dr. Tresha Gibbs]

Respondent, Organization of Resident Representatives (ORR) Information
Session, “The Medical Encounter 2.0,” American Association of Medical
Colleges ORR Professional Development Conference, Providence, R.I.,
March 2011 [Dr. Javeed Sukhera]

Poster (accepted for presentation), “The Rochester Youth Violence
Partnership: Engaging a High-Risk Community With a University Health
System Through a Public–Academic Partnership” University Health
System Consortium Annual Conference 2011, Chicago Ill., September 2011
[Dr. Javeed Sukhera]
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RESEARCH

Working on neuro-imaging research in pediatric bipolar disorder [Dr.
Donna Roybal]

Implementing a research project that involves conducting focus groups
with Cambodian adolescents whose parents are refugees [Dr. Nicole
Christian]

Cultural Psychiatry International Experience—field research on the
mental health system in the Dominican Republic to improve treatment of
Dominican patients in Washington Heights, N.Y. [Dr. Tresha Gibbs]

Quality Assurance Analysis and Report of Emotional Literacy Program in
a New York, N.Y., Special Education Public School, June 2011 [Dr. Vanessa
Bobb]
BOOKS/JOURNAL ARTICLES/MANUALS

Bobb, Vanessa Toney, L. Fredrik Jarskog, and Barbara J. Coffey. 2010.
“Adolescent With Treatment-Refractory Schizophrenia and ClozapineInduced Cardiomyopathy Managed With High-Dose Olanzapine.” Journal
of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology. 20(6):539–43 [Dr. Vanessa Bobb]

“Remember Those Living Atop the Hill at Kissy Mental Hospital.” Sierra
Leone News, May 2011, www.sierraexpressmedia.com/archives/24146 [Dr.
Mandy Garber]
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
Sukhera, Javeed. 2010. “Implications of Continuity of Care and Residency
Training on Patient and Trainee Safety.” American Journal of Psychiatry
(Residents’ Journal). 5(8):6 [Dr. Javeed Sukhera]

Sukhera, Javeed, Catherine Cerulli, Barbara A. Gawinski, and Diane
Morse. In press. “Bridging Prevention and Health: Community
Perceptions of Intimate-Partner Violence in Rural Honduras.” Journal of
Family Violence [Dr. Javeed Sukhera]

Sukhera, Javeed. In press. “Teaching and Learning Moments: Burial in
Completion” Academic Medicine. [Dr. Javeed Sukhera]
AWARDS

Appointed to the Board of Directors, American Association of Medical
Colleges [Dr. Javeed Sukhera]

Georgia Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Advocacy
Fellowship Award, appointed to AACAP Policy Statement Advisory
Committee [Dr. Sarah Vinson]

Won third place in the resident poster competition at the South Carolina
Psychiatric Association meeting on preliminary results from research on
telepsychiatry interest and exposure in residency and fellowship training
[Dr. Juliet Glover]
Selected Dissertations of ANA Nurse Fellows Who Earned Their
Doctoral Degrees Between 2002 and 2010:
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Table 8.1. Selected Doctoral Dissertation Topics of MFP Nurse Fellows, 2001–10
Racial/Ethnic
Minority
Other
(Filipino
American)
African
American
African
American
African
American
Asian
American
African
American
Native
American
African
American
African
American
African
American
African
American
Dissertation Title
Year
Prevalence of Depression and Substance Use in Hawaii
Among Asian and Pacific Islander Adults With Chronic
Illness
Comparison of Depression, Anxiety, Hazardous
Drinking, Subjective Burden, and Caregiver Rewards in
African American and Caucasian Family Caregivers of
Patients With Chronic Liver Disease
Depression and HIV Risk–Related Sexual Behaviors
Among African American Adolescent Females
The Relationship Among Self-Efficacy, Spirituality, and
Social Support in the Recovery of Substance Abusers
Trust and Health Care Cost Among Vulnerable
Populations
The Relationship Between the Abnormal
Electrophysiological Features and the Degeneration in
Cognition, Behavior, Daily Functioning, and Global
Presentation Manifested by People With Alzheimer’s
Disease
Sense of Belonging as Connectedness to Selected Areas
of Health and Traditional Practices in American Indians
Social Determinants of Depressive Symptoms, Sexual
Risk, Substance Use, and Suicide Risk Behaviors in
Adolescents
Predictors of Depressive Symptoms and Obesity in
African American Women Transitioning From Welfare
to Work
The Mental Health Experiences of Adolescents of Color
in Foster Care
Personal Characteristics, Chronic Stress, and Depressive
Symptoms in African American Women in Midlife
2010
81
2007
2007
2005
2001
2003
2005
NA
2009
2007
2008
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
9. Selected Profiles of MFP Fellows
M
FP Fellows are extraordinary people doing extraordinary
things. To capture the essence of MFP Fellows’
accomplishments, this report presents brief profiles of selected
MFP Alumni gathered from each MFP Grantee.
American Nurses Association
Marife C. Aczon–Armstrong, Ph.D., M.S., R.N.
Dr. Aczon–Armstrong was appointed as Community Executive for the
Aloha United Way in 2005, where she learned leadership skills while bringing
people together to create a healthier, more compassionate community. She is
currently Assistant Professor at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa. She uses her
expertise in case management/utilization management, counseling, mental
health, health care insurance, diabetes education, and
medical/surgical/oncology nursing in every aspect of her career in nursing. In
2003, Dr. Aczon–Armstrong was an Advisory Committee Panel member for the
Domestic Violence Hotline’s Filipina Advocacy Project serving the Filipinos in
Hawaii. She represented the case management experts as a Panel member during
the 2001 Muscular Dystrophy Association of Hawaii Conference.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Lois Bolden, Ph.D., PMHCNS, B.C.
Dr. Bolden graduated in December 2006 from the University of Tennessee
Health Science Center, Memphis (UT Memphis). She was the recipient of the UT
Memphis 2005–06 Excellence in Teaching Award. Dr. Bolden was also one of the
instructors who delivered the convocation speech during the UT Memphis
College of Nursing graduation. Dr. Bolden is currently Director of Psychiatric
Services at the Veterans Administration Hospital, Tampa, Fla.
Josepha Campinha–Bacote, Ph.D., R.N.
Dr. Campinha–Bacote is President and Founder of Transcultural C.A.R.E.
Associates ( www.transculturalcare.net), a private consultation service that
concentrates on clinical, administrative, research, and educational issues in
transcultural health care and mental health. Dr. Campinha–Bacote is one of the
nation’s most influential theorists, consultants, and advocates in transcultural
health care and mental health nursing. She has been nationally and
internationally acknowledged for her expertise in models and standards of
cultural competence for health care training and professional development. A
third generation Cape Verdean, she has worked to enhance the cultural
competence of employees and health care professionals in managed health care
organizations, acute and long-term care medical centers, academic institutions,
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
community outreach centers, international organizations/institutions, faithbased organizations, and the federal government, among others.
Dr. Campinha–Bacote developed a conceptual model, The Process of Cultural
Competence in the Delivery of Healthcare Services: A Culturally Competent Model of
Care, which several colleges of nursing, pharmacy, social work, and medicine
have incorporated into their undergraduate and graduate programs of study. She
also developed A Biblically Based Model of Cultural Competence in the Delivery of
Healthcare Services: A Culturally Competent Model of Care, which is being used in
curricula for allied health professions and seminaries.
In 2000, Dr. Campinha–Bacote served on the National Advisory Committee to
the federal Office of Minority Health (OMH, within the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services) to develop standards of culturally and linguistically
appropriate services (CLAS) in health care. During 2002–07 as a consultant to
OMH, she helped OMH implement these CLAS standards by assisting in the
development of the Cultural Competency Curricula Modules for family
physicians, and of the Cultural Competency Nursing Modules Project. She
currently serves as a consultant to the National Center for Cultural Competence
(Washington, D.C.), and several Health Resources and Services Administration
grants concentrating on cultural competence in the health professions.
A Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing, Dr. Campinha–Bacote has
received many honors and awards, including the Transcultural Nursing Society
Leadership Award, the Distinguished Lecturer Award from Sigma Theta Tau
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
International, the 2007 University of Rhode Island Distinguished Achievement
Award, the 2006 Health Knowledge Award from the Ohio Commission on
Minority Health, and the 2006 Lifetime Achievement Award from the University
of Rhode Island’s Multicultural Center. She was honored by the University of
Rhode Island College–School of Nursing as Alumnus of the Year in 2000, and
received the University of Rhode Island Alumni Excellence Award in 2001.
In transcultural health care and transcultural psychiatry, Dr. Campinha–
Bacote has given more than 1,000 national and international presentations,
authored 42 articles and coauthored another 18, and has written three
books/monographs and coauthored a fourth. She received The Journal of
Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services’ 2007 Article of the Year Award
(“Becoming Culturally Competent in Ethnic Psychopharmacology”).
Gloria B. Callwood, Ph.D., R.N.
Dr. Callwood is Director of the School of Nursing and Principal
Investigator of the Caribbean Research Institute at the University of the Virgin
Islands. Within the government of the Virgin Islands hospital system (1962–
1995), Dr. Callwood served in leadership positions ranging from staff nurse,
head nurse, supervisor, and nurse consultant to psychiatric liaison for
Medical/Surgical Units; as psychiatric liaison, she advised on the care of clients
experiencing crises. In her private practice, she
provides counseling to
individuals and families . For more than 4 years, she has served as a writer of
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
test items for the Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools.
Moreover, she has consulted with international Ministries of Health, including
that of the Kingdom of Lesotho, South Africa.
Christopher Lance Coleman, Ph.D., M.S., MPH, APRN–B.C., ACRN,
FAAN
Dr. Coleman is Fagin Term Associate Professor of Nursing and
Multicultural Diversity and Associate Professor of Nursing in Psychiatry,
Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Coleman is
best known for his research on the health-compromising sexual behaviors of
HIV–seropositive African American men middle-aged and older who have sex
with men exclusively, or with both men and women. Additionally, he is
researching the health-compromising sexual behaviors of incarcerated African
American men. Dr. Coleman also is investigating strategies used by HIV–
seropositive individuals to manage HIV–related symptoms and the physical
sequalae associated with Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy.
Dorothy Powell, Ed.D., R.N., FAAN
Dr. Powell is Associate Dean for Global and Community Health Initiatives
at the Duke University School of Nursing. An internationally renowned nurse
educator, Dr. Powell is Founding Director of the Duke University School of
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Nursing Office of Global and Community Health Initiatives. The Office
addresses health disparities locally and abroad by promoting opportunities for
academic enrichment, service-learning, and research. Dr. Powell’s career has
emphasized community service, particularly for people who are vulnerable
because of low income or other difficult life circumstances. She has been
engaged in international development work since the late 1980s. Before joining
Duke University in 2006, Dr. Powell served for 18 years as Chief Academic
Officer for Nursing at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
Stephanie L. Ferguson, Ph.D., R.N., FAAN
For several years, Dr. Ferguson was Nursing and Health Policy
Consultant and Director of the Leadership for Change Program, International
Council of Nurses, Geneva, Switzerland. She was appointed by former U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Tommy Thompson
to the National Advisory Council for Nursing Research, National Institutes of
Health (NIH). In 2001, she was appointed by the U.S. Department of Defense to
serve as an expert on global health issues for the National Security Forum. Dr.
Ferguson is a member of the Red Cross International Task Force for Nursing
Issues and is Treasurer of the Board of Directors of Virginia Health Information,
Inc. She is a frequent consultant to the World Health Organization (WHO),
Geneva, Switzerland. She also has provided expertise to the Pan American
Health Organization, in her capacity as a Consultant to the WHO Chief Nurse
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Scientist. In 2000, Dr. Ferguson contributed to the WHO49.1 Resolution on
“Strengthening Nursing and Midwifery.” She was Editor in Chief of Nursing and
Midwifery Links (official publication of the Global Network of WHO
Collaborating Centres for Nursing and Midwifery Development). In 1996–97, Dr.
Ferguson was a White House Fellow and worked with the Honorable Donna E.
Shalala when she was HHS Secretary. Dr. Ferguson is Co-Editor of the “Child
Health Policy” column and Editor of the “Research to Health Policy” column for
the Journal of Pediatric Nursing. She also is a member of the Editorial Board for the
Newborn and Infant Nursing Reviews Journal. She continues to serve as the
National League for Nursing Consultant to the National Student Nurse
Association’s Board of Directors. Dr. Ferguson served on the Health Resources
and Services Administration Task Force for examining nursing workforce issues
related to racial, ethnic, and gender diversity. Dr. Ferguson has had many
gubernatorial appointments in Virginia.
Jillian Inouye, Ph.D., APRN, B.C.
Dr. Inouye is Professor, Graduate Chair, and Director, Office of Nursing
Research, School of Nursing and Dental Hygiene, University of Hawaii at Mānoa
(Honolulu, Hawaii).
A licensed psychologist, Dr. Inouye also is a qualified mental retardation
professional, a board-certified clinical specialist in psychiatric nursing, and an
advanced practice registered nurse. She has published many data-based refereed
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
manuscripts on a variety of psychiatric and mental health topics ranging from
child abuse prevention to HIV/AIDS to health beliefs and behaviors. She has
written book chapters on Asian/Pacific Islanders’ health disparities and
psychiatric care, including schizophrenia, depression, substance use, and abuse
and others. She was a founding member of the Asian/Pacific Islander Nurses
Association and currently serves as Vice President and Board member of the
National Coalition of the Ethnic Minority Nurses Associations. Dr. Inouye has
presented her research in Denmark, Hong Kong, Japan, Switzerland, Thailand,
and elsewhere. She volunteers at various mental health service facilities and
provides mental health care to underserved persons in her local communities in
Hawaii. Her extensive acquired knowledge and skills uniquely equip her to
serve vulnerable people and their families.
Jennie R. Joe, Ph.D., MPH, M.A.
Dr. Joe is a member of the Navajo
Nation. She is a faculty member in the
Department of Family and Community
Medicine (DFCM), College of
89
A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Medicine, at the University of Arizona.
Since 1987, Dr. Joe has also been
Director of the Native American
Research and Training Center in the
DFCM. A medical anthropologist who
has been engaged in many communitybased research projects with American
Indian/Alaska Native communities,
she was a member of the Institute of
Medicine’s Committee to Assess Racial
and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
She also was a member of the National
Human Research Protections Advisory
Committee to the U.S. Secretary of
Health and Human Services. She is a
longtime member of the federal Indian
Health Service’s International Review
Board. In her research and teaching,
the thrust of her work is in chronic
diseases, disabilities, gender, and the
sociocultural context of these issues.
Mayola Rowser, Ph.D., DNP, FNP–B.C., PMHMP
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Dr. Rowser is currently Clinical Instructor and Grant Project Coordinator
at the University of Southern Indiana School of Nursing and Health Professions.
As Project Coordinator on a 5-year Division of Nursing grant, she facilitates the
provision of health care services by students and faculty to inmates at county
correctional facilities. She is the first known nurse to earn a Doctor of Philosophy
in Nursing degree and a Doctor in Nursing Practice (DNP) degree in the United
States. Dr. Rowser was awarded $1.2 million, over 5 years, from the Health
Resource Services Administration as Principal Investigator for a study titled the
“Expansion of Medical and Mental Health Services to the Detainees at the
Vanderburgh County, Ind., Correctional Facility.”
Ella M. Scott, Ph.D., R.N., CNS, B.C.
Dr. Scott is Co-Chair of the Canton, Ohio, Town Hall Committee on Race
Relations, and Associate Professor at Kent State University (Kent, Ohio) She also
is a certified Clinical Nurse Specialist in community health, and is the Founder,
Chief Executive Officer, and Executive Director of the Community Wellness
Center of Stark County, Ohio. Dr. Scott received the 2003 Outstanding Nursing
Alumni Award, Aultman Hospital School of Nursing; served as Legislative
Liaison to Ohio Senator Scott Oelslager; and was invited to serve as United States
Nurse Delegate to foreign countries in the People-to-People Ambassador
Program, Washington, D.C. Dr. Scott has presented her research at many local,
national, and international meetings including the Sixth World Congress on
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Stress in Vienna, Austria; the 19th World Congress of the World Association for
Social Psychiatry in Prague, Czech Republic; and at the 2008 Sigma Theta Tau
International Conference in Singapore.
Phyllis W. Sharps, Ph.D., R.N., CNE, FAAN
Dr. Sharps is Professor and Chair, Department of Community Public
Health, at the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing. As an expert in
maternal and child health nursing, a researcher, and a mentor to the next
generations of Johns Hopkins nurses, Dr. Sharps works at the forefront of
community and public health nursing and at the interface of mental and physical
health. In addition to serving as Chair of the Johns Hopkins University School of
Nursing Department of Community Public Health, Dr. Sharps is also the director
of three health and wellness centers operated by the School of Nursing; provides
care in a Baltimore, Md., shelter for homeless battered women and their children;
and conducts ongoing community-based, participatory research. The
overarching attention of her work is to the effects of intimate partner violence on
the physical and emotional health of pregnant women, infants, and very young
children. With a $3.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health, Dr.
Sharps is testing the Domestic Violence Enhanced Visitation Program, a
promising intervention to keep abused women and babies safe from intimate
partner violence. She shares the new clinical knowledge gained through her
research in many nursing and public health scholarly publications and as a
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
consultant and speaker for numerous organizations, including the Family
Violence Prevention Fund and the National Institute of Justice. Dr. Sharps also
consults on cultural competency in research conducted among African American
women and in African American communities.
Lillian Tom–Orme, Ph.D., MPH, M.S., R.N., FAAN
Dr. Tom–Orme is Research Assistant Professor, Department of Family &
Preventive Medicine Health Research Center, University of Utah and Consultant,
Diabetes Project, Indian Walk-In Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. Her research
interests are broad and varied but center on health and mental health beliefs,
behaviors, and outcomes among American Indian people. She conducts research
on diabetes, breast and cervical cancer, health policy, and health systems issues,
and employs both qualitative and quantitative research methods in her
investigative approaches. Her research support is extensive, and the emphasis
again is on health outcomes and lifestyle-related behaviors. She participates
with the Agency for Health Care Research on Minority Health. Moreover, she is
a member of the Panel of Experts, Office of Women’s Health, Public Health
Service, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. She also is a member of
the Institutional Review Board, Indian Health Service.
Sara Torres, Ph.D., R.N., FAAN
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Dr. Torres is Dean of the School of Nursing at the University of Medicine
and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark, N.J. She is nationally known for her
research on interpersonal violence; she conducted one of the first comparative
studies in the nation of Hispanic women’s attitudes toward domestic violence.
She has received funds from the National Institute of Health, has published
many articles, and has presented at state, national, and international conferences
on domestic violence research. Dr. Torres is the editor of a book, Hispanic Health
Care Educators Speak Out, and of Hispanic Health Care International, the official
journal of the National Association of Hispanic Nurses. She was a Visiting
Professor, College of Nursing, University of Puerto Rico, San Juan. Dr. Torres has
functioned at the national level on committees of many associations, including
the American Nurses Association (ANA), the American Academy of Nursing,
the National League of Nursing, the Food and Drug Administration
Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee, the U.S. Department of
Justice, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Violence Against
Women Advisory Council, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Advisory Committee on Injury Prevention and Control. Further, Dr. Torres is a
past president of the National Association of Hispanic Nurses. Currently she is
on the board of the Kellogg-funded Community Scholars Program and the
ANA’s MFP National Advisory Committee. She has reviewed grants from many
NIH components and is currently a reviewer for the National Institute of
Nursing Research.
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Margaret A. Wheatley, Ph.D., R.N., CNS
Dr. Wheatley is a faculty member of Case Western Reserve University,
Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing, and instructs undergraduate and
doctorate of nursing students in psychiatric and mental health nursing. While at
Case Western Reserve University but before joining its faculty, Dr. Wheatley
served as Project Director for two NIH grants—one on low-intensity exercise in
the frail elderly, and the other on brain trauma and behavioral changes in
children. She has been a mental health/psychiatric nurse for more than 30 years
and has worked most of that time with vulnerable people including the elderly
as a clinician, manager, and administrator. Dr. Wheatley served as the President
of the Ohio Nurses Association (ONA) for 4 years (1993–97). Before her term as
President of ONA, she was the founding Chair of the ONA Minority Issues
assembly (still the largest special interest group in ONA).
AMERICAN PSYCHIATRIC ASSOCIATION
Kenneth Ashley, M.D.
Dr. Ashley is Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at the Albert
Einstein College of Medicine and an attending psychiatrist in the Division of
Consultation–Liaison Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine at Beth Israel Medical
Center. He also is Director of Mental Health Services in the Peter Krueger AIDS
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Center. Dr. Ashley is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychological
Association (APA) and an Alumnus of the APA/National Institute of Mental
Health (NIMH) Minority Fellowship. He has been active in the APA at both the
local and the national levels. He is the former President of the New York County
District Branch, a current Assembly Representative, and is active on various
committees, including the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) Issues
and AIDS Committees. At the national level he has been involved with both the
Committee on GLB (gay, lesbian, bisexual) Issues and the AIDS
Committee/Steering Committee of the APIRE (American Psychiatric Institute for
Research and Education) Committee on HIV Psychiatry, as well as a Site Director
for the APA Minority Medical Student HIV Psychiatry elective. He is President
of the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists, Immediate Past President of
the Society for Liaison Psychiatry, the New York metro area component of the
Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine, a member of the LGBT Committee of the
Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry, and a member of the Executive
Council of the recently approved World Psychiatric Association Section on
HIV/AIDS. Dr. Ashley has presented on issues in HIV, LGBT, and cultural
diversity both nationally and internationally. He also has two chapters in the
2012 APPI (American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc.) textbook, The LGBT Casebook.
Pamela L. Collins, M.D., MPH
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Dr. Collins joined NIMH as Associate Director for Special Populations and as
Director of the Offices for Special Populations, Rural Mental Health Research,
and Global Mental Health. The NIMH Office for Special Populations develops
and coordinates research policies and programs to ensure increased emphasis on
the mental health needs of women andminorities. The Office of Rural Mental
Health Research directs and coordinates research activities and information
dissemination on conditions unique to those living in rural areas, including
research on the delivery of mental health services in such areas. The Office of
Global Mental Health coordinates, participates in, and reports on international
activities with respect to mental health research.
As Assistant Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and the
Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University, Dr. Collins conducted
research on the mental health aspects of the AIDS epidemic. Domestically and
internationally, she worked to ensure access to HIV prevention and care for
people with severe mental illness, as well as access to mental health care services
for people with HIV. Under Dr. Collins, NIMH will deepen its concentration on
disparities in mental health both inside and outside of the United States. In this
country, her studies have addressed the HIV–prevention needs of women with
severe mental illness and the contribution of social stigma related to mental
illness and ethnicity to women’s HIV risk. Internationally, she has conducted
training of health care providers in mental health, HIV/AIDS transmission,
prevention, and counseling in Argentina, Rwanda, South Africa, Uganda, and
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A History of the SAMHSA Minority Fellowship Program ~DRAFT
Zambia. Dr. Collins has served as a consultant to the Directorate of Mental
Health in South Africa and as a member of its Task Team for Policy Guidelines
on HIV/AIDS in Psychiatric Institutions. She has served on the Advisory Group
for the Movement for Global Mental Health and is a member of the World
Health Organization Integrated Management of Adult and Adolescent Illness
mental health working group. She retains her faculty appointments at Columbia
University, where she is Assistant Professor of Clinical Epidemiology at the
Mailman School of Public Health (MSPH), and is Assistant Professor of Clinical
Psychiatry at the College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Collins directed the
Interdepartmental Global Health Track and was Co-Director of the Initiative for
Maximizing Student Diversity at the MSPH.
Daniel L. Dickerson, D.O., MPH
Dr. Dickerson is a double board-certified psychiatrist and an addiction
psychiatrist. He is also Assistant Research Psychiatrist at the Integrated
Substance Abuse Programs (ISAP) at the University of California, Los Angeles.
He has been affiliated with ISAP since 2007. He is a member of the American
Psychiatric Association’s Transformational Leadership Academy.
Dr. Dickerson’s primary research interests concentrate on understanding
substance abuse among American Indians/Alaska Natives (AI/ANs) and on
developing culturally tailored substance abuse treatments for AI/ANs. But his
research interests also include community-based participatory research and
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translating his research findings to benefit the broader community. He is
Principal Investigator on an NIH/National Center for Complementary and
Alternative Medicine–funded R–21 study, “Drum-Assisted Recovery Therapy for
Native Americans.” This study delves into the final development of a culturally
relevant treatment approach using drumming and a follow-up pilot study of this
treatment protocol. Dr. Dickerson has authored publications on substance use
disorder treatment outcomes among AI/ANs, mental health and substance use
characteristics among urban AI/AN youth, and comorbid psychiatric and
substance use disorders among a sample of American Indian Veterans with
nicotine dependence. He is also the author of the chapter “American
Indians/Alaska Natives” in Pedro Ruiz and Eric C. Strain, eds., Substance Abuse:
A Comprehensive Textbook, Fifth Edition (2011).
Helena Hansen, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Hansen is a Robert Wood Johnson Health and Society Scholar,
Columbia University, and Addiction Psychiatry Fellow, New York University
(NYU) Medical Center, in New York, N.Y. She also completed fieldwork in
Havana on Cuban AIDS policy, in urban Connecticut on harm reduction and
needle exchange, and in Puerto Rico on faith healing in evangelical Christian
addiction ministries founded and run by self-identified ex-addicts. The
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connecting thread in her work has been a concentration on the moral economy of
marginalized people and their strategies for navigating institutions and unequal
power relations through different stages of substance use and HIV risk. Her
work has been published in both clinical and social science journals ranging from
Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, and Medical Anthropology to the Journal of the
American Medical Association and the Journal Medical Care. After graduate school,
she completed a clinical residency in psychiatry at NYU Medical
Center/Bellevue Hospital, during which she also undertook a political–economic
investigation of therapy with buprenorphine. In this study she examined the
social and political implications of the effort to establish addiction as a
biomedical—rather than a moral or social—condition, as well as the ways the
neurochemical treatments may be reinscribing hierarchies of ethnicity and race.
As a Robert Wood Johnson Fellow, she will further develop these themes, using
cultural–historical comparison with methadone maintenance therapy and other
harm-reduction movements in the United States.
Toi Blakley Harris, M.D.
Dr. Harris is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Baylor College of Medicine,
Menninger Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. She is the first to
hold the position as Director of Diversity Education and Training at Baylor
College of Medicine. She is founder and director of the Texas Regional
Psychiatry Minority Mentor Network (TRPMMN), an arm of APA’s National
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Minority Mentors Network. Through TRPMMN, has created a model for other
regions to formalize their mentoring efforts.
Dr. Harris was Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Baylor from 1999
to 2005. She completed her psychiatry residency and a child and adolescent
Fellowship at Baylor. During her residency, she was a recipient of resident
Fellowships, including the APA/Center for Mental Health Services Minority
Fellowship and the APA/Mead–Johnson Fellowship.
William B. Lawson, M.D, Ph.D., DFAP
Dr. Lawson is currently Professor and Chairman of the Department of
Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Howard University College of Medicine
and Hospital. He is also Professor on the graduate faculties of psychology and
pharmacology. He is President-Elect of the Washington Psychiatric Society, a
Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, and a member of
the American College of Psychiatrists. He is past Chair of the National Medical
Association’s (NMA’s) Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Section, and past
President of Black Psychiatrists of America. He received the Howard University
Faculty Senate Creativity and Research Award, and the National Alliance for the
Mentally Ill’s Exemplary Psychiatrist Award and Outstanding Psychologist
Award. He was twice named one of “America’s Leading Black Doctors” by Black
Enterprise Magazine, and was the Andrea Delgado Honoree and Lecturer for
Black Psychiatrists of America. Dr. Lawson received the Jeanne Spurlock Award
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from the American Psychiatric Association, the E.Y. Williams Clinical Scholar of
Distinction Award from NMA’s Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Section, and
a Multicultural Workplace Award from the Veterans Administration for
outstanding contributions to the advancement of diversity and multicultural
understanding.
John Luo, M.D.
Dr. Luo is Associate Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at the UCLA Semel
Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, Department of Psychiatry,
where he is Associate Director of Psychiatric Residency Training and Director of
Psychiatric Emergency Services. Nationally recognized as an expert on use of
technology in medicine, he presents yearly at the American Psychiatric
Association Annual Meeting. His courses on how to use a technology in the
practice of medicine have been a staple of the APA scientific program for more
than 10 years. He is a past-president of the American Association for Technology
in Psychiatry and now serves as its Gores Chair of Informatics Advocacy. Dr.
Luo is currently a member of the Committee on Information Systems for the
American Psychiatric Association, and he served previously on the Committee of
Telemedical Services. For the Association for Academic Psychiatry, he served as
the Use of Technology in Education Work Group Chair. He writes several
technology-oriented columns, including “Tech Advisor” for Primary Psychiatry
and “Connections” for Psychiatric News. He serves on the editorial advisory
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board of “Medicine on the Net” and Spyglass Consulting. He has consulted for
several health care technology firms, and he has been interviewed by many
publications on his use of various technologies in medicine. Dr. Luo completed
his medical informatics Fellowship at University of California, Davis,
Department of Psychiatry, where he implemented an electronic signout process
using the Palm PDA. He was Chief Resident and resident at the Harbor–UCLA
Medical Center in Psychiatry. During his residency, he was a recipient of
fellowships including the Laughlin Fellowship of The American College of
Psychiatrists and the APA/Center for Mental Health Services Minority
Fellowship for his pioneering use of technology in medicine. Heis a longstanding
member of the American Medical Informatics Association.
Daniel B. Martinez, M.D.
Dr. Martinez is a Diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and
Neurology, and is certified in both Adult and Child Psychiatry. He is also
certified by the American Board of Independent Medical Examiners. He
graduated in 1995 from Loyola Stritch School of Medicine and completed his
training in child psychiatry at Northwestern Children’s Memorial Hospital in
2000. He serves as medical director of two community mental health agencies:
Pilsen Wellness Center and Lutheran Social Services of Illinois. He is President of
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Comprehensive Clinical Services, P.C. (www.discoverccs.org), a
multidisciplinary private practice. He has a faculty appointment as Associate
Clinical Professor for the Department of Psychiatry, at the University of Illinois
at Chicago and is the former Chair of the Child and Adolescent Committee for
the Illinois Psychiatric Society. He participates in numerous civic and
professional organizations and has received many awards recognizing his
contributions in many areas of service and academic achievement. He is a
member of the Council on Minority and Mental Health Disparities for the
American Psychiatric Association. He is presently working on a recommendation
to the U.S. Government regarding how it should deal with detained immigrants
who have mental illness. His main areas of interest/expertise are attention deficit
and hyperactivity disorder, anxiety disorders, psychiatry, and the law,
community psychiatry, and cultural and spiritual issues in treatment.
Stephen McLeod–Bryant, M.D.
Dr. McLeod–Bryant is the Service Line Medical Director for the Institute of
Psychiatry at the Medical University of South Carolina. He previously served as
Vice Chair for Clinical Affairs, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral
Sciences, the Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, S.C. He
completed his Residency at Tufts–New England Medical Center. His specialty is
Adult Psychiatry. He is a Diplomate, National Board of Medical Examiners and a
Diplomate, American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, Inc. Dr. McLeod–
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Bryant served as President of the APA Black Caucus and currently serves as
APA Assembly Representative.
Kenneth M. Rogers, M.D., MSHS
Dr. Kenneth Rogers is currently Professor and Chair, Department of
Psychiatry, Greenville Hospital Systems/University of South Carolina School of
Medicine, Greenville. Before accepting his current appointment, he was Director
of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Training at the University of Maryland. He
completed medical school, residency, and a Fellowship in child and adolescent
psychiatry at the University of South Carolina/William S. Hall Psychiatric
Institute. He completed a Master of Science in Health Services at the University
of California, Los Angeles, where he also received an NIMH K–award to further
pursue his research interest. His research and clinical pursuits have concentrated
on factors related to the identification and referral of youth for mental health
services in the juvenile justice system. He was Director of the Court Evaluation
Clinic for the Circuit Court of Baltimore City, Md. He has testified as an expert
witness in criminal cases in several states and has served as a juvenile justice and
family welfare consultant in Illinois, Maryland, and South Carolina. Dr. Rogers
was elected in 2006 for a 3-year term as a Counselor at Large of the American
Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. He is a Fellow of the APA and
currently serves on the Council of the South Carolina Psychiatric Association.
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Denese O. Shervington, M.D., MPH
Dr. Shervington has an intersectional career in both academic psychiatry
and public mental health. She is President and CEO of the Institute of Women
and Ethnic Studies, a community-based translational public health institute in
New Orleans, La., where she directs the community-based postdisaster mental
health recovery program and a federally funded Teenage Pregnancy Prevention
Program. Dr. Shervington is also Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Tulane
University, where her concentration is on residency education and training. She
completed her residency in psychiatry at the University of California, San
Francisco. Dr. Shervington is certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and
Neurology. In 2006, she was awarded the Isaac Slaughter Leadership award by
the Black Psychiatrists of America. She is a member of the American College of
Psychiatrists and the Black Psychiatrists of America.
AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION
Hortensia Amaro, Ph.D.
Dr. Amaro is Associate Vice Provost for Community Research Initiatives and
Dean’s Professor of Social Work and Preventive Medicine at the University of
Southern California. She was previously Associate Dean of the Bouvé College of
Health Sciences at Northeastern University, Distinguished Professor of Health
Sciences and Counseling Psychology in the Bouvé College of Health Sciences,
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and Director of the Institute on Urban Health Research. She received her doctoral
degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1982 and was awarded
an Honorary Doctoral Degree in Humane Letters by Simmons College in 1994.
Over the past 27 years, Dr. Amaro’s work has concentrated on improving the
connections between public health research and public health practice. Her
research has resulted in more than 120 scientific publications. Her work has
delved deep into studies of alcohol and drug use and addiction among
adolescents and adults, the development and testing of behavioral interventions
for HIV/AIDS prevention, substance abuse and mental health treatment for
Latina and African American women and incarcerated men, alcohol and drug
use among college students, and behavioral interventions for HIV medications
adherence. Dr. Amaro has served on the editorial board of prominent scientific
journals such as American Journal of Public Health, and on review and Advisory
Committees to the Institute of Medicine, the National Institutes of Health, the
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, SAMHSA, and the CDC. She is
currently a member of the SAMHSA National Advisory Council.
After joining Northeastern in 2001, Dr. Amaro established the Institute on
Urban Health Research (IUHR) to promote interdisciplinary and communitybased research that leads to a better understanding of the causes of disease and
racial and ethnic health disparities, and to develop and test strategies that
improve health in urban communities. Research at IUHR has concentrated on
health conditions that disproportionately affect urban and minority populations.
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Dr. Amaro helped found many professional organizations and communitybased service agencies including the National Hispanic Psychological
Association, the National Hispanic Science Network on Drug Abuse Research,
the National Trauma Consortium, the Latino Health Institute, and the
Multicultural AIDS Coalition in Boston, Mass. In the past two decades, she
founded three substance abuse treatment programs for women in Boston. She
served as a Distinguished Visiting Professor in Women’s Health at Ben Gurion
University in Israel. Dr. Amaro has served on the Board of the Boston Public
Health Commission, the governing body of the city health department, since its
inception. In 2005, she was named one of the hundred most influential Hispanics
by Hispanic Business Magazine.
Ana Mari Cauce, Ph.D.
Dr. Cauce, Provost of the University of Washington (UW), joined the
Faculty of Arts of Sciences in 1986. She earned her Ph.D. in Clinical/Community
Psychology at Yale University. She holds a joint faculty appointment in
American Ethnic Studies, and secondary appointments in the Department of
Women’s Studies, Latin American Studies, and the College of Education. Her
previous administrative positions include Chair of the Department of American
Ethnic Studies and the Department of Psychology, Director of the UW Honors
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Program, and Executive Vice Provost. Her term as Dean of the College of Arts
and Sciences began in April 2008. Throughout her career, Dr. Cauce has been an
active teacher and mentor to scores of undergraduate and graduate students. Her
students have included winners of the Guthrie Senior Thesis award in
Psychology, the Office of Minority Affairs (OMA) Vice Presidential Award, and
Presidential Medalists. She is the recipient of the UW Distinguished Teaching
Award and continues to teach every summer in the OMA Summer Transition
Program. Dean Cauce is a Fellow of both the American Psychological
Association and the American Psychological Society. Her primary research
concentration is on competence and problem behavior among adolescents,
especially those growing up in at-risk environments, including youths from
ethnic minority backgrounds, and homeless youth. Her work in these areas has
been recognized with the Excellence in Research Award from APA, the Dalmas
Taylor Distinguished Contribution Award from APA, and the Distinguished
Contribution Award from the Society for Community Research and Action. She
is presently Co–Principal Investigator on the “Familias” study, which is
examining social and cultural factors affecting Mexican American families and
their early adolescent children. She also conducts research on and interventions
in increasing the diversity of the academic labor force in the STEM (Science,
Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) disciplines, serving as Principal
Investigator on the University of Washington National Science Foundation (NSF)
ADVANCE grant and on the National Academy of Sciences Committee on
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Maximizing the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering,
which produced Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in
Academic Science and Engineering. A recipient of the National Institute of Mental
Health’s FIRST Award for Young Investigators, Dr. Cauce’s research has been
funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, the National
Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), NSF, the Sloan Foundation, and the W.T. Grant
Foundation. She recently (2006) completed a term as President of the Society for
Community Research and Action. She also has served as Associate Editor of
American Psychologist, Child Development, and American Journal of Community
Psychology.
Michele Cooley–Strickland, Ph.D.
Dr. Cooley–Strickland is a licensed psychologist who joined the University
of California, Los Angeles, faculty in 2009. She is a Research Psychologist at the
Center for Culture and Health, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral
Sciences, David Geffen School of Medicine, NPI (Neuropsychiatric Institute)–
Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. She also is Associate
Professor, Department of Mental Health, Bloomberg School of Public Health at
the Johns Hopkins University. She completed her clinical internship at the
Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic in Pittsburgh, Pa., and her postdoctoral
Fellowship in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the
Medical University of South Carolina. After her training, Dr. Cooley–Strickland
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was Assistant Professor of (Clinical) Psychology at George Mason University for
2 years, and then joined the Johns Hopkins University faculty in 1996. She is a
community-based clinical child researcher, preventive interventionist, and
teacher. She has been the principal investigator of grants funded by NIMH
designed to study the emotional and behavioral outcomes of youths’ exposure to
community violence. One of the grants was a pilot study of a school-based
preventive intervention with inner-city children exposed to community violence
who are at risk for anxiety disorders. Dr. Cooley–Strickland is currently the
principal investigator of a NIDA R01 prospective cohort longitudinal study that
investigates community violence as a risk factor for internalizing and
externalizing behaviors, co-occurring substance use, and academic achievement
problems, as well as protective factors that attenuate those adverse outcomes.
That study, Multiple Opportunities to Reach Excellence (MORE) Project, contains
three annual waves of data collection from 746 urban children, their teachers,
and their parents. She has made those data available to manycolleagues and
students for theses, dissertations, presentations, and publications. Dr. Cooley–
Strickland has given nearly a hundred regional and national presentations and
has more than 35 peer-reviewed publications, book chapters, and coauthored
clinical treatment intervention manuals. She has been active in the National
Institutes of Health, serving on several advisory committees and nearly 30
special emphasis panels.
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Kermit Anthony Crawford, Ph.D.
Dr. Crawford is a licensed psychologist and a designated forensic
psychologist. He is Director of the Center for Multicultural Mental Health
(CMMH) and the Center for Multicultural Training in Psychology (CMTP) in the
Division of Psychiatry at the Boston University School of Medicine and Boston
Medical Center. CMMH has provided extensive services to family members of
the victims who were on the flights into the World Trade Center towers during
the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and to first responders who were involved in the
search, rescue, and recovery efforts. Dr. Crawford has facilitated and provided
disaster behavioral health response training across the nation on behalf of
SAMHSA and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. CMMH continues
to provide training to responders in the aftermath of the Haiti Earthquake of
2010 and the Tohoku Earthquake of 2011 in Japan.
Dr. Crawford is in his 13th year as Director of CMTP, the oldest multicultural
predoctoral psychology internship program in the nation (40 years). To date,
more than 270 interns have been trained, 85 percent of whom have been from
minority groups. Dr. Crawford has expertise in mental health, psychology
training, substance use conditions, and workforce development, and extensive
experience in disaster behavioral health response and mental health training. He
is Principal Investigator for several state and federal research and training grants.
He has published in refereed journals and is lead author of a recent book chapter
on culturally competent disaster behavioral health services. Dr. Crawford has
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received many awards including the Commissioner’s Excellence Award
(Massachusetts Department of Mental Health) and the 2011–12 Excellence in
Diversity Training Award from the Association of Psychology Postdoctoral and
Internship Centers. In addition to his earned doctorate from Boston College, Dr.
Crawford is recipient of an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the
Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology. He has made featured
presentations on evidence-based culturally competent practices in mental health
at the Legislative Breakfast of the Congressional Black and Hispanic Caucuses,
the National Mental Health Association, the National Alliance on Mental Illness,
APA, and other national organizations. He serves on several mental health
advisory committees. He is a psychologist with the National Football League
assigned to the New England Patriots. His career is committed to spanning
cultures and to providing quality, equitable mental health and behavioral health
services to diverse, underserved groups.
Miriam E. Delphin–Rittmon, Ph.D.
Dr. Delphin–Rittmon was appointed by the Obama Administration to
SAMHSA as Senior Advisor to the Administrator in the Office of Policy,
Planning, and Innovation. She was previously Assistant Professor and CoDirector of Cultural Competence and Health Disparities Research and
Consultation with the Program for Recovery and Community Health (PRCH) of
the Yale University School of Medicine. As Director, Dr. Delphin–Rittmon and a
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team of PRCH faculty and Fellows consult with national, state, and local
organizations in a variety of areas related to individual, organizational, and
service system–level cultural competence, including training, program design
and evaluation, and strategic planning geared toward eliminating behavioral
health disparities. In this capacity, for the past 5 years, Dr. Delphin–Rittmon has
consulted with the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction
Services on its Health Disparities Initiative. Goals of this initiative are to identify
behavioral health disparities within the state; and to develop, implement, and
evaluate interventions and policies aimed at reducing disparities and increasing
system cultural competence. Additional interests include conducting training in
cultural competency, diversity, and racism prevention; performing technology
transfer and empowerment evaluation work with grassroots, community-based
organizations; conducting research exploring ethnic differences in coping and
help-seeking behavior; and assessing the impact of race and stereotyping biases
on the clinical judgment process.
Larke Nahme Huang, Ph.D.
Dr. Huang is a licensed clinical–community psychologist. She was
appointed the Senior Advisor on Children, Office of the Administrator, within
SAMHSA, in April 2006. She is currently the inaugural Director of SAMHSA’s
Office of Behavioral Health Equity. In these positions, she has provided
leadership on federal national policy pertaining to mental health and substance
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use issues for children, adolescents, and families. She is also the agency lead on
cultural competence and eliminating disparities. Dr. Huang has worked in
children’s mental health for the past 25 years, assuming multiple leadership roles
dedicated to improving the lives of children, families, and communities. She has
extensive experience as a community mental health provider and practitioner; as
a researcher and university faculty member; and, most recently, as a developer of
public policy for children’s health and mental health services. She has worked
with states and communities to build systems of care for children with serious
emotional and behavioral disorders and their families, providing technical
assistance on infrastructure and service delivery issues. Dr. Huang has
developed programs for underserved, culturally and linguistically diverse youth,
evaluated community-based programs, and authored books and articles on
children’s mental health. Two recent publications are Children of Color:
Psychological Interventions with Culturally Diverse Youth (2003) and Transforming
Mental Health Care for Children and Their Families (2006). She was a member of the
Carter Center Mental Health Task Force; a member of the APA Committee on
Children, Youth, and Families; Chair and member of the Advisory Committee
for the APA Minority Fellowship Program; a founding member and Board Vice
President of the National Asian American/Pacific Islander Mental Health
Association; and a founding board member of the National Alliance of MultiEthnic Behavioral Health Associations. In spring 2002, she was appointed a
commissioner on the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health,
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where she co-chaired the Subcommittee on Children and Families and
contributed to the “Issue Paper on Cultural Competence.” Dr. Huang recently
received the following honors: Distinguished Contributions to Psychology in the
Public Interest, American Psychological Association, 2006; Outstanding
Psychologist of the Year, National Alliance of the Mentally Ill, 2005; Presidential
Citation, APA, 2004; Distinguished Contributions Award, Asian American
Psychological Association, 2004; and Champion for Children’s Mental Health
Needs, Federation of Families for Children’s Mental Health, 2003.
Frederick T. L. Leong, Ph.D.
Dr. Leong is Professor of Psychology (Industrial/Organizational and
Clinical Psychology Programs) and Director of the Center for Multicultural
Psychology Research at Michigan State University. He has authored or
coauthored more than 110 articles in various psychology journals, as well as 70
book chapters. In addition, he has edited or co-edited 10 books. Dr. Leong is a
Fellow of the APA (Divisions 1, 2, 12, 17, 45, 52), the Association for
Psychological Science, the Asian American Psychological Association, and the
International Academy for Intercultural Research. His major research interests
center on culture and mental health, cross-cultural psychotherapy (especially
with Asians and Asian Americans), and cultural and personality factors related
to career choice and work adjustment. He is past president of APA’s Division 45
(Society for the Psychological Study of Ethnic Minority Issues), the Asian
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American Psychological Association, and the Division of Counseling Psychology
in the International Association of Applied Psychologists. He currently serves on
the APA Board of Scientific Affairs, the MFP Advisory Committee, and the
Commission on Ethnic Minority Recruitment, Retention, and Training Task
Force. He is the 2007 co-recipient of the APA Award for Distinguished
Contributions to the International Advancement of Psychology.
Beverly Daniel Tatum, Ph.D.
Dr. Tatum received her doctorate in clinical psychology from the University
of Michigan in 1984. Her research interests include “black families in white
communities,” racial identity in teens, and the role of race in the classroom. In
2002, she became the ninth President of Spelman College in Atlanta, Ga. Before
her appointment at Spelman, she served in various roles, as Professor of
Psychology, Department Chair, Dean of the College, Vice President for Student
Affairs, and Acting President, during her 13-year tenure at Mount Holyoke
College in South Hadley, Mass.
Dr. Tatum is perhaps best known for her critically acclaimed 1997 book, Why
Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations
About Race, in which she argues that “straight talk” about racial identity is
essential to the nation. The book goes beyond the usual black–white paradigm,
as it provides real-life examples and the latest research, dispels race as a taboo,
and gives readers a new means for understanding the emergence of racial
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identity as a developmental process, which all individuals experience. She has
also been widely recognized for authoring Assimilation Blues: Black Families in a
White Community—Who Succeeds and Why? (1987). In addition, she has published
numerous book chapters and other works, including her classic 1992 Harvard
Educational Review article, “Talking About Race, Learning About Racism: An
Application of Racial Identity Development Theory in the Classroom.”
She has served on several college committees and community services
boards. She has received many awards, including the Mary Hudson Onley
Award (along with her father, Dr. Robert A. Daniel, an artist and educator) from
the Hall of Black Achievement at Bridgewater State College, the National
Association of Multicultural Education Book of the Year Award, the Association
of Women in Psychology Publication Award, and the Commonwealth Citation
for Meritorious Service and Distinguished Service Award at Westfield State
College.
Melba J.T. Vasquez, Ph.D.
Dr. Vasquez received a special MFP award for her leadership as 2011 APA
President and the distinction she brings as an MFP Alumna. Dr. Vasquez
received her doctorate from the Scientist–Practitioner Counseling Psychology
Program at the University ofTexas (UT) at Austin in 1978. She is an independent
practitioner in Austin. Her areas of scholarship are ethics, multicultural
psychotherapy, psychology of women, supervision, and training. She has
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provided leadership service to the profession of psychology for three decades.
Before becoming a psychologist, Dr. Vasquez taught English and political science
in middle school. While working on a master’s degree in counseling, she was
encouraged to apply to UT’s doctoral program. As a member of the first
generation in her family to attend college, Dr. Vasquez had never until then
considered obtaining a doctorate. Involvement as a member of the first cohort of
the APA Minority Fellowship Program provided a powerful socializing process
into the profession and incentive to contribute to the discipline. After graduation,
Dr. Vasquez served as a psychologist in the university counseling center,
directed the internship training program, and taught in the counseling
psychology doctoral program at Colorado State University and, later, at UT.
After 13 years, she embarked on fulltime independent practice while continuing
active involvement in scholarship, mentoring, professional leadership, and
advocacy. Dr. Vasquez has served on the APA Board of Directors and in various
roles in APA governance, including as member or chair of a dozen APA boards,
committees, and task forces. Her experience initiating new, major projects
includes co-founding the National Multicultural Conference and Summit as well
as Divisions 45 (Society for the Psychological Study of Ethnic Minority Issues)
and 56 (Trauma Psychology). Dr. Vasquez is a past president of APA Divisions
17 (Society of Counseling Psychology) and 35 (Society for the Psychology of
Women) and the Texas Psychological Association. She served as an APA council
representative from Divisions 17, 42 (Psychologists in Independent Practice), and
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45. She has advocated for psychology at the state and federal legislative levels,
receiving both the Heiser Award and the APA Advocacy Award. She has
coauthored three books: Ethics in Psychotherapy and Counseling, How to Survive and
Thrive as a Therapist, and APA Ethics Code Commentary and Case Illustrations. She
has written more than 65 journal articles and book chapters, and has served on
the editorial boards of 10 journals. She is currently writing a book on
multicultural therapy for an APA Theories of Psychotherapy Monograph Series.
COUNCIL on SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION
Trenette T. Clark, Ph.D., LCSW
Dr. Clark is Assistant Professor in the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill’s School of Social Work. Her primary research interest is racial and
ethnic health disparities in the context of drug use among adolescents,
particularly African American adolescents. She also has some interest in rural
behavioral health issues stemming from her roots in rural northeastern North
Carolina. She holds a nonprofit leadership certificate from the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is licensed to practice clinical social work in
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North Carolina and Washington, D.C. Before pursuing her doctoral degree, Dr.
Clark was a psychotherapist and social worker at Duke University Medical
Center in the Department of Neurology. Dr. Clark has assisted in managing
several federally funded intervention research efforts. She is currently Principal
Investigator of research projects including “Elucidating Links Between ADHD
Symptoms and Tobacco/Alcohol Use Trajectories,” funded by the National
Institutes of Health; “From Young Lady to Lady: Racial/Ethnic Disparities in
Smoking Among African American Young Adult Women,” funded by the
American Association of University Women; “From Adolescence to Young
Adulthood: The Puzzle of Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Tobacco Use Among
African Americans,” funded by the Junior Faculty Development Award,
University of North Carolina; and “Age Patterns and Predictors of Smoking: A
Replication,” funded by the University Research Council, University of North
Carolina. Dr. Clark’s research has been published in several peer-reviewed
journals (such as the Journal of Black Psychology, Social Work Research, and the
Journal of Child & Adolescent Substance Abuse), as book chapters, and in research
reports. She has presented her research at many local, state, national, and
international conferences.
Waldo E. Johnson, Jr., Ph.D., MSW
Dr. Johnson is Associate Professor, School of Social Service Administration
and Faculty Affiliate, Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture of the
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University of Chicago. He is Principal Investigator for the Chicago Parenting
Initiative Evaluation Study, a multiyear evaluation study of the impact of male
parenting enhancement assistance to young fathers on their physical and
psychological well-being as well as on the well-being of adolescent African
American and Latina parenting mothers and their children served by Access
Community Health Network in 18 of Chicago’s south and southwest
neighborhoods. He is examining the physical and mental health statuses of
disconnected African American males in the South Side Health and Vitality Studies,
a family of medical, public health, social science, and community-based
participatory research studies of the Urban Health Initiative aimed at improving
the health and well-being of Chicago’s South Side residents in 34 community
areas served by the University of Chicago Medical. Dr. Johnson serves as a
research consultant for the Urban Institute’s “Race, Place and Poverty: An Urban
Ethnographer Symposium on Low-Income Men” and Mathematica Policy
Research “Parents and Children Together (PACT),” a multiyear evaluation of the
Administration for Children and Families’ Healthy Marriage and Responsible
Fatherhood grants initiative. He was a research consultant at the Warren Institute
of Berkeley Law School and the California Endowment in developing a
California-based research, policy, and practice initiative concentrated on
enhancing the status of boys of color; and for Chicago Community Trust and
United Way of Metropolitan Chicago in the development of their respective
African American Male Initiatives, both of which concentrate on fatherhood and
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family, education and human capital development, physical and behavioral
health, mentoring, and human justice policies. He is a member of the Ford
Foundation Scholars Network on Masculinity and the Well-Being of African
American Males; Chair, Commission on Research, Council on Social Work
Education; and editor of Social Work with African American Males: Health, Mental
Health and Social Policy. Dr. Johnson was awarded a Ford Foundation
Postdoctoral Fellowship and an NIMH HIV/AIDS Postdoctoral Fellowship.
Charles E. Lewis Jr., Ph.D., MSW
Dr. Lewis is Deputy Chief of Staff and Communications Director for Rep.
Edolphus Towns (D–NY10). He is also Assistant Professor at Howard University
School of Social Work, where he teaches courses in social welfare policy and
research that concentrate on adolescents and mental health services. He earned
his doctorate in social policy analysis at Columbia University. He serves the
community as president of the board of directors for the Mental Health
Association of the District of Columbia and as a member of the Citizen’s
Advisory Committee for the District of Columbia Department of Corrections. Dr.
Lewis’ areas of scholarship include incarceration of African American males,
services to low-income families, faith-based services, and the impact of public
opinion.
Rogério M. Pinto, Ph.D., MSW
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Dr. Pinto is a Brazilian American psychiatric social worker with a decade
of clinical practice experience serving immigrants and minority individuals,
groups, and families in New York, N.Y. As a clinical worker, Dr. Pinto provided
bilingual mental health services to youths, adults, and families, and clinical
services to mentally challenged individuals in low-income communities. His
community work includes conducting communitywide needs and resources
assessments, program evaluations, and supervision and implementation of
curricula on HIV and substance use prevention. He specializes in CommunityBased Participatory Research and has done most of his teaching and research in
the United States and Brazil. After receiving his Ph.D., Dr. Pinto joined a 3-year
NIMH–funded Postdoctoral Fellowship at the HIV Center for Clinical and
Behavioral Studies at the New York State Psychiatric Institute. In 2007, he
received a Mentored Research Development Award (K01) from NIMH to
examine factors that facilitate researchers’ collaborations with HIV service
providers, and to develop evidence-based models of collaboration that can be
tested and replicated. Dr. Pinto is conducting several other research projects,
both in Brazil and New York, to further study the role of providers in HIV
prevention research and factors that influence engagement and retention of
community-based collaborators in health-related research. His research has been
funded by NIMH, the HIV Center for Clinical and Behavioral Studies, the
International Association of Schools of Social Work, and a Columbia University
Diversity Initiative Research Fellowship.
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Halaevalu Vakalahi, Ph.D., MSW
Dr. Vakalahi, a native of Tonga, is currently Associate Professor of Social
Work and Director of the MSW Program at George Mason University. She
previously worked as an accreditation specialist for the Council on Social Work
Education and served as Lecturer and Coordinator for the Baccalaureate Social
Work Program at San Francisco State University, Assistant Professor and Chair
at Brigham Young University–Hawaii, and Assistant Professor at New Mexico
State University. She currently serves on the National Association of Social
Workers’ National Committee on Racial and Ethnic Diversity and on the Council
on Social Work Education’s Commission on Diversity and Social and Economic
Justice. Dr. Vakalahi also received a Hartford Faculty Scholars Award for her
study on Pacific Islander elder health and well-being and a Fulbright Senior
Scholars Award for her study on Maori elder health and well-being. Her areas of
scholarship include Pacific Culture and Community (children, youth, and elders)
and Women of Color in Academia.
Gregory Washington, Ph.D., LCSW
Dr. Washington is currently Assistant Professor at the University of
Memphis and serves his community in several capacities. He is Director of the
LeMoyne–Owen College Community Development Corporation Ujima Family
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Wellness Center and works as a local clinical practitioner. A licensed clinical
social worker, he has practiced as an individual, family, and group therapist in
Arkansas, Georgia, Illinois, and Tennessee. Dr. Washington has more than 20
years of clinical, administration, and consulting experience. His scholarship and
research interests include culturally centered empowerment methods and the
risk and protective factors associated with child and adolescent development. A
major goal of his work is to identify and promote the use of innovative culturally
sensitive interventions that reduce disparities in behavioral health and
incarceration outcomes among persons of color. Dr. Washington focuses much of
his current professional activities on teaching, clinical practice, health promotion,
and community wellness interventions and research. He has published several
peer–reviewed journal articles and book chapters, has spoken at professional
meetings nationally and internationally, and facilitates professional in-service
training, mentor training workshops, men’s health workshops, and youth and
community development workshops.
Darrell Wheeler, Ph.D., MSW
Dr. Wheeler is Dean and Professor at the Loyola University Chicago
School of Social Work. Before taking this position Dr. Wheeler was Professor and
Associate Dean for Research and Community Partnerships at the Hunter College
School of Social Work. He was also on the doctoral faculty of the City University
of New York (CUNY) School of Public Health, The CUNY Graduate Center, and
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a member of the Center for Study of Gene Structure and Function at Hunter
College. Dr. Wheeler has more than 20 years of research and community
partnership experience with the local and national Black MSM (men who have
sex with men) community. His most recent research includes both qualitative
and quantitative research on HIV risk and resiliency among Black MSM. This
work has included evaluating “homegrown” or locally developed behavioral
interventions for Black MSM; Brothers y Hermanos, an epidemiological study of
Black MSM; and serving as HPTN 061 protocol Co-Chair and Co–Principal
Investigator for a Transgender Risk Reduction study (CDC); and many
evaluation projects. He has served on the New York City Prevention Planning
Group and on review panels for the CDC, NIH, NIMH, and the University of
California. He currently serves on the editorial boards of Journal of Gay and
Lesbian Social Services, International Journal of Men’s Health, and Journal of
HIV/AIDS in Social Services. Dr. Wheeler is a Fellow in the New York Academy of
Medicine and a member of the American Public Health Association and the
National Association of Social Workers (national Vice President 2009–12). His
overall research agenda and publications concentrate on the identification and
exploration of individual and communal resiliency in HIV prevention and
intervention, with particular emphases on African American and Black gay,
bisexual, and transgender communities.
Nikki R. Wooten, Ph.D., LCSW–C
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Dr. Wooten is Assistant Professor at Boston University School of Social Work,
where she teaches Clinical Practice Foundation courses and developed the course
“Clinical Practice With Military Personnel, Veterans, and Their Families.” Her
research interests include military and deployment stressors, postdeployment
mental health and substance use, behavioral health service utilization in military
personnel and veterans—particularly Army women -- and gender differences in
postdeployment health. In 2010, Dr. Wooten was selected as a NIDA Social Work
Research Scholar for addictions research mentoring for early career investigators.
She is Co-Investigator on the NIDA–funded, First Longitudinal Study of Missed
Treatment Opportunities Using DoD and VA Data and was awarded a NIDA
Diversity Supplement to study the “Early Identification of Substance Use and
Psychological Problems in Army Women Veterans.” She is also Principal
Investigator of A Mixed Methods Study of Military and Deployment Experiences of
Army Women and Military Social Work Competency in Social Work Professionals and
coauthor of Military Combat Deployments and Substance Use: Review and Future
Directions. She serves as a grant reviewer for the Department of Defense
Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs. A former Research Fellow
at the U. S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences and a
Department of Veterans’ Affairs Predoctoral Fellow, Dr. Wooten is a licensed
clinical social worker with more than 16 years of experience providing services to
civilian and military families in child welfare, family violence, and child sexual
abuse forensic assessments, and expert testimony in military court-martials.
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Before entering academia, Dr. Wooten was a child therapist at Navy Family
Advocacy and a social work consultant for the Armed Forces Center for Child
Protection at the National Naval Medical Center. Currently, she is a Major in the
District of Columbia Army National Guard, with 22+ years of military service as
enlisted Soldier in the Army Reserves, as Logistics and Staff Officer in the Army
National Guard, and as a 2011 graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General
Staff College.
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10. Responding to
New Opportunities and Challenges
T
he newly enacted health care reform law, the “Patient Protection and
Affordable Care Act of 2010,” contains many provisions that call for
the kind of training and career support that the MFP has provided
hundreds of minority behavioral health professionals over the past four decades.
More People to Be Insured for More Services
It is estimated that 32 million uninsured people will eventually be covered
by health insurance and receive an expanded array of health care services.
Among the benefits deemed “essential” and required to be covered by state–
sponsored insurance exchanges are mental health and substance use disorder
services. The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008 requires
that, as of 2010, mental health and substance use disorder services receive the
same levels of coverage as other medical care service offered by insurers. Taken
together, the 2008 mental health parity and 2010 health care reform laws will
extend mental health and substance abuse services to millions of additional
individuals and families. Many more service programs, administrators, and
clinicians will be needed.
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Focus on ‘Underserved’ Populations and Places
The health care reform statute provides for significant expansion of
programs and services that affect “underserved” populations and places,
including substantial increases in the number and size of community health
clinics, and school and workplace wellness and health care programs.
“Underserved populations” are defined as individuals or families without
insurance coverage, especially uninsured low–income persons (and their
families) who work for employers that do not offer insurance, or affordable
insurance; and unemployed workers whose COBRA (Consolidated Omnibus
Budget Reconciliation Act) benefits have expired and who are not eligible for
Medicaid or Medicare. “Underserved areas” are defined as geographic areas that
do not have sufficient health services to meet the population’s needs, including
rural areas and neighborhoods with high concentrations of poverty within urban
areas.
Workforce Training and Expansion
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 provides for
increasing the supply of health care workers and supports training of health
professionals through scholarships and loans. The Act establishes new funding
sources to train “a diverse workforce,” and “promote cultural competence
training of health care professionals.” The Act contains specific provisions that
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support the “development of interdisciplinary mental and behavioral health
training programs.” Funds are authorized to support training programs on
primary models that, among other focal points, integrate physical and mental
health care.
Special provisions in the Act address the current and projected shortages of
nurses and nurse retention. The law supports nurse training programs, loan
repayment and retention grants, and the creation of opportunities for a “career
ladder to nursing.”
Working together, the six MFP association Grantees could help behavioral
health policymakers and service providers at all levels (Federal, regional, state,
and community) explore ways of organizing and delivering mental health and
substance use disorder care in the most cost–effective ways. Among the possible
topics for MFP coordinated thinking and action:

Developing and testing model team approaches to behavioral health
prevention and intervention for diverse racial and ethnic minorities that
involve several MFP disciplines. Such models could take into account
unique racial or ethnic community attitudes toward mental health or any
kind of “counseling” or “treatment,” and identify roles for each profession
in helping address readiness and other issues.

Identifying ways to partner with Recovery to Practice (RTP) initiatives
housed in the same professional associations, often in the same association
units, to increase the cultural competence of mental health and substance
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use disorder care to minorities by assuring that minority persons in
recovery participate fully in the identification of care goals, methods, and
outcomes. Persons in recovery serve as culturally competent care givers in
peer-supported or peer-run mental health and substance use disorder
systems of care. For example, the American Psychological Association has
initiated a partnership with the SAMHSA’s RTP initiative by integrating
recovery–based principles in trainings for current Fellows and inviting
persons in recovery to share their lived experience with mental health and
substance use conditions.

Developing a cross-discipline advocacy capacity among predominantly
minority behavioral health professionals (for example, MFP current and
past Fellows, MFP coordinating staffs, association leaders) that could
concentrate on generating MFP and other program outcome information
to use in campaigns for better policies, funding, and other supports to
minorities in underserved areas.

Designing a “strategic research and service improvement plan” that
identifies key issues for strengthening mental health and substance use
disorder outcomes among minorities, improving the status of knowledge
development and knowledge use regarding these issues, identifying
suggested priorities for investigating and filling gaps in knowledge
generation and utilization, and devising a coordinated approach for
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sharing and making use of minority-focused research and practice
information among participating behavioral health disciplines.
Fortified by its 40-year history of success in professional development and
career support, SAMHSA’s Minority Fellowship Program stands ready to help
fulfill the promise of health care reform—reaching out to, and improving the
behavioral health outcomes for, those who have been served the least and need
the most.
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